I am writing this review in response to one Matthew Y. posted. I've bid on many auctions R.L. Spears Co. Inc. has placed online and was quite shocked to read that review because all of my experiences with ALL of the various auction house sites have been quite the opposite of what Matthew Y. states was his.
I would like to give the reader a little real information and background about how R.L. Spears works. The site will post up auctions that are run out of several different locations, all in Los Angeles county. All of the auction bids start at $1.00, or sometimes even less than a dollar depending on what's being sold. There is a 13% commission that is added to the winning bid of every lot which goes to the auction lot housing site team - Levi Goldstein is one of those team leaders, for lack of a better way to describe it. The 13% commission, as far as I can tell, is the auction house team's payment for (perhaps finding items, but not sure) receiving lot shipments, inspecting shipments, categorizing then numbering each item or lot, testing (or not testing but making that "untested" information clear in the items blurb), photographing, description blurb write up, as well as providing excellent client assistance for all prospective/bidders on the inspection and post auction item pick up days. Spears does not provide shipping of items and the buyer is responsible for picking up their winning auction items from the team/address the auction is held out of. Auction houses have a standard limit on the amount of time prospective buyers can examine the lots that are up for bids and Spears (via the lot housing sites) is no different, giving 2 whole days, 9am - 4pm, to do so. They also allow (in most cases) two days for the items to be picked up. *** SIDE NOTE : On one occasion I won some items from a "newbie" auction site team that gave only one day from items to be retrieved, I was running late (standard for me :) to pick up my items. In a mini-panic I phoned R.L. Spears and explained I was running late and to my delight the auction site actually stayed open to wait for me. Me - just one person out of thousands. ***
Now I would like to give the reader some factual information about my, and my uncle Dale's, personal experiences with OTHER ONLINE to ON SITE AUCTION HOUSES _ ONES NOT RUN BY Mr. Spears. Awful. If you are unhappy, disappointed, misinformed, jipped, horn-swaggled and/or ripped off these other sites absolutely do not care. They have their money and that's that. My uncle Dale spent hours trying to make right what two other sites ripped him off on (the items were absolutely NOT what they were represented as - condition wise) and I believe he had to go through his credit card company to dispute them - one of which he won and the other he just took the loss on. In stark contrast, both mine and my uncle's Dales experiences with R.L. Spears and each of the various auction house site/teams we've won items from (a total of 5 different places/teams we have collectively dealt with INCLUDING Levi Goldstein and his team) has always been very satisfactory. We have found some awesome deals on things we have resold, as well as personal items we use today! My uncle Dale bought a brand new remote controlled medical bed for a friend of his for $16 , as well as lots of great pet food items, clothes, designer suits and more! I have been shocked on many occasions by the volume of his lot wins versus the literal dollars he spent on them. I have won many items from Spears, here are a few : vintage clothing both me and my kids wear, a set of brand new 16in x 6in lock boxes (lot of four - I paid $4.50 for all four of them and have two happy eBay customers who EACH bought them from me for $15 plus $10 shipping - Buy It Now style! I kept one of them for myself and gave the other as a gift), a random box of "Kimko's Items" for $4.00 that ended up being a treasure trove of beautiful cards, high quality colored stock paper and some old, non-circulated postcards, one of which I just sold on eBay for $10!
Lastly, I would like to address Matthew Y. and his various complaints about his own experience with Spears/Levi Goldstein. MATTHEW Y. MAKES SEVERAL FALSE STATEMENTS ABOUT HOW THESE AUCTIONS ARE RUN. INSPECTIONS OF ITEMS MEANS... INSPECT! I was just at Levi's yesterday picking up some won items and I PERSONALLY OBSERVED 1.) outlets for testing 2.) some guy who apparently brought his own home desktop computer with monitor in order to test out some PCI or whatever cards that are up for auction right now - who was being assisted by Mr. Goldstein himself 3.) someone else who was inspecting items, taking them out of their box etc, unassisted, who then had some questions about an item and was politely assisted by one of the other team members. Matthew Y. is one those people who gets stuff for free by complaining & I challenge the reader to try Spears for themselves before listening to him. read more