The Roundness of Antiquity Valuations from Auction Houses and Sales

Abstract

Auction houses employ in-house art experts to assess the value of objects that will potentially be o¤ered for sale. Items that will be placed on the auction block are …rst published in catalogs with the experts'estimates of the objects'valuations. For each item to be auctioned, the catalog provides an upper-and lower-bound estimate of the object's market value. This paper examines whether the roundness of those estimates is related to the likelihood that the item was sold and its eventual hammer price. We …nd that rounder lower estimates reduce the likelihood that the item is sold and, if it is sold, the hammer price is lower. The roundness of the upper estimate seems to have no impact on the auction outcome.