Best of Both Worlds

Want the convenience of an auction combined with the security of knowing your minimum price is going to be met? Try a sealed-bid auction. Rather than going through a straight auction, a seller determines a minimum price for the asset. Potential buyers have time to look at and review the property before bidding. Then, the top five bidders in that process advance to a live auction. “Typical assets go in and out of contract three times,” says Louis Fisher, a broker with Sperry Van Ness's Accelerated Marketing Division. “This method means they go through one time.”