Collection Of Auction Catalogs - What To Do With Them?

They are pretty and they have nice pictures and write ups.

Unless the auction is for something extraordinary, like the unique 1933 Saint, I would not keep them

Bottom line though is they pretty much aren't worth diddly squat and cost a small fortune to ship.

Maybe the heirs should donate them and take a tax write off if possible?

You might contact the Newman Numismatic Portal and Washington you in St Louis. They have scanned 100s of auction catalogs to preserve them for the future. And, no, they won't pay for them, but it's about the only interest I can think of.

Thanks MV,

I'll try to help a little here. I collect only US auction catalogs, and so far the other posters are right on the money as to values, unless these are earlier catalogs from the 1950's and earlier you might have some value, if any are hardbound covered or have additional photographic plates they are worth money, otherwise not much value sorry to say. I buy from weight on most newer catalogs, usually .10 cents/per pound. I've passed on 2 full storage lockers for $5K (later they reduced the price to $3K) full of books and catalogs because they smelled like mold, and most were easy to find already or I had them (my collection is around 3K catalogs now, I only look for a very few I need/want anymore). Some US auction catalogs are always worth paying a small premium on, early Stacks, Superior any Chapmans, Levitt, Mason, Elder (most of those are from the 1880-1930's) The Stack's (1920'-1950's) and Superior if they are early 60's through early 70's might have an extra value. Prices realized sheets are also quite valuable, maybe more than a common catalog, many catalogs are still around, not so with the prices realized sheets that followed them. I have a huge list of PR's I need still in my database of catalogs.

Writing inside them can be worth more, depending on what it is, from a major purchaser with his notes, or the cataloger with their notes. Otherwise they are considered damaged and used for research copies only. Mold, water damaged ripped covers, missing pages, basically recycle material. I've had 25 file boxes full I couldn't give away to anyone, schools, libraries, (I tried) ended up in a recycle paper dumpster back pre-Internet. Now I use ebay to track sale prices on catalogs, most modern ones get sold in lats of 10 or so catalogs for cheap, usually the shipping is the main cost on them. I haven't bought any myself in over a year from ebay, but I still keep an eye out for ones I might want or need.

Big sellers are Bryce Brown, KOlbe & Fanning and Charles Davis in US stuff, the later two dealers also do Ancient, foreign and oddball stuff as well, might be worth a contact to any of them.