The percentage of lots in an auction that successfully sell. A healthy estate auction typically achieves 80–95% sell-through. Sell-through rate is the primary performance metric for auctioneers — it reflects catalog quality, pricing, marketing effectiveness, and audience match.
How It Works in Practice
Factors that increase sell-through: no-reserve pricing, accurate and detailed descriptions, multiple high-quality photos, effective marketing to the right audience, and reasonable opening bids. Factors that decrease sell-through: high reserves, poor descriptions, limited photos, wrong audience targeting, and oversized catalogs. AI cataloging tools improve sell-through by producing better descriptions and capturing identification details that attract specialist bidders who might otherwise skip poorly-described lots.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is a good sell-through rate for estate auctions?
How can I improve my auction sell-through rate?
Catalog Faster with AI
Gavelist generates professional lot descriptions from your photos in seconds — across every auction category, at any volume.