Corbett's Auction House — Local services in Littleton

I have sold items with Corbett’s Auction house 3 times, and will never sell with them again.

My first sale was a decent experience. I brought in 10-15 boxes of collectible art glass (Mostly Fenton, Vaseline glass, lots of hobnail glass). Lou was friendly and informative. He said they would wait a few weeks to auction my items because some of their regular glass enthusiasts were out of town. Right on! So, they waited, took their time, did a nice job of advertising my glass items, and my items sold for a fairly good price.

A few weeks later, I dropped off some more items to Corbett’s (5-10 boxes of antiques, miscellaneous collectibles, rocks & minerals, more glass, some tools). I was very trusting, since Corbett’s had done such a nice job on my first sale. When I dropped my items off, a sticker with my consignment number on it was slapped on my boxes and I was on my way. About a month later, I recieved a check in the mail for $42. I understand that some items are hit and miss at auctions, but there were some nice items in those boxes. Unfortunately, their “item descriptions” were so vague on my invoice that I literally had no way of knowing what actually sold for what. The last item on my invoice was “6 boxes of wares”, which sold for $2.50 (after their 30% commission, I got $1.75). Didn’t seem logical, but it’s in the contract that if you don’t specifically set a reserve price, they can sell your items for whatever they choose (oh yeah, and if you set a reserve price and it is not satisfied, there is a $100 fee to the seller, that seems totally fair).

Even after that experience, I thought I would give Corbett’s one more try. I was pretty stressed on money, so I decided to bring in the rest of my glass collection (the high end glass I had been holding on to). I brought in 10-15 very valuable pieces of Hobbs Brockunier glass from the 1880s and a few rare Fenton pieces). I brought my boxes in on Wednesday, they posted my items on their website on Thursday, and sold my items at auction that weekend. I was a little upset they didn’t take more time to advertise the items (the pictures of my glass were at the very end of the photo gallery, almost akin to an afterthought), but hoped for the best nonetheless. I waited, and waited, and waited, after 2 months, still no check. I called Corbett’s to see what was up with my check and they said that they didn’t have any record of me selling items with them during the timeframe I gave them. Luckily, after my previous experience with their terrible inventory system, I had taken it upon myself to screenshot their website’s photo gallery showing my items before the auction so I could try to match my invoice to the actual items sold after the auction. They asked me to send in my pictures, which I did. They said they wrote the wrong consignment number on my boxes and that they sent my earnings to someone else! They looked through their inventory list from that auction and the only items that had descriptions that they believe match the photos I sent them were “2 boxes of hobnail glass, one box of milk glass, and one box of hobnail glass”. If these lots were in fact my items (it’s impossible to know for sure), that means they lumped all my high end glass together in box-lots, instead of auctioning each piece off individually. The returns I recieved were a very very small fraction of what the glass is worth. While I was quite livid, there was nothing I could really do... Somebody got away with one...

Corbett’s Auction House is an unethical company and I feel that they ripped off my family's treasures.

I arranged for Corbett’s to do a complete home clean out in Mar of 2023 of a 2 story 4 bedroom home w/full basement w/1 bedroom and 4 other room sections in addition to 2 outside sheds filled with 4 generations of family treasures from 1893, 1918, 1932, 1942 and 1960.

They took hundreds of items. Mid-century modern furniture, household goods, vintage toys, dolls, antiques, vintage furs, purses, hats, sewing machines including one antique sewing machine with a pedal. and many more vintage knickknacks and this is just to name a few! The final accounting… I paid Corbett’s $3800 to clear out the entire house and received a check of just over $900 a year and a half later in 2024. We would have been better off having a yard sale and selling everything for $1. Or better yet, donating to a worthy charity.

I worked with Sunny, the owner. The only time she returned my calls was to get my business.The rest of the time-silence. She was unreachable and unresponsive by phone & email. I left numerous phone & email messages w/no response. They provided a barely legible page and a half of item that were sold that were not even close to listing what they took.

When I was finally able to reach someone by phone it was bc I blocked my own number and finally someone answered my call. The person I spoke to was new and knew nothing. Sunny returned one call only to tell me she would check again on my items and then no further communication was made. We even had our estate lawyer send Corbett’s Auction House a letter and even they failed to get a response from anyone.

I felt Sunny herself was unprofessional on the job. She cherry picked what she wanted, and took her smoke breaks on my family’s porch while her crew took two days to clear out everything in the entire house. I found this to be extremely disrespectful.

I’ll only say one good thing about her crew. They were respectful and hard-working other than that, nothing good came out of this experience whatsoever with Corbett’s.

My family and I were completely heartbroken and devastated. Not only were we coping with the death of the last loved one to have lived in that house, but we were faced with having to part with the belongings of 4 generations of treasures as well as sell a home that had been lovingly cared for by my great grandparents, grandmother, a great aunt, mother and me personally for over a half a century. To be taken advantage of and stolen from in such a blatant manner is despicable. I’m sure my family and I are not the first to feel taken advantage of and ripped off by Corbett’s and unfortunately probably not the last.

I hope that anyone else reading this review will think twice...

In 2020, I contracted with Corbetts Auction House to inventory, transport and sell a large volume of items from an estate I was responsible for managing. I worked closely with Todd Baumgartner, Sonnie Jarosz and other members of the Corbetts Team over the course of more than a year and a half in the interests of closing this estate. Their knowledge, good counsel, and special expertise working with estates of all sizes were enormously helpful while working with them from start to finish. In addition, their organizational and management skills were outstanding.

They were prompt, efficient, and highly reliable with the handling and disposition of all items they committed to sell. When necessary, special efforts were extended to refurbish items to enhance their value and presentation at time of sale. They provided much needed good counsel, creative solutions and recommendations throughout the entire process.

Every company representative I worked with was informative, courteous and helpful with the transport and sale of items from the estate. Team members were also helpful in referring me to contacts and resources to sell items in the estate which Corbetts declined to handle. Their knowledge and history of experience were invaluable to the tasks necessary for the dissolution of a large estate.

For all these reasons and more, I’m pleased to be able to recommend Corbetts Auction House as a local, reputable company providing valuable resources and support necessary for the successful sale of items...