Auction House
History
Private investors are responsible for the establishment of the auction houses. These centers of commerce exist in the heart of each nation, and are truly vital for adventurers. The main purpose of the auction house system is to provide a means of circulating goods required for successful adventuring. This system works on the principle of awarding goods put up on auction to the highest bidder.
It is said that the lack of readily available supplies after the Great War is what gave rise to Jeuno's black market. However, with increasing numbers of adventures, the auction house business prospered--and new auction houses sprung up everywhere as each country sought to gain a piece of the profits. With the addition of delivery services and a revolutionary style of management utilizing linkpearls (allowing business to be conducted in remote areas such as Kazham), the auction houses have truly become a convenient form of trading.
The windows of the auction houses are constructed in such a way that the staff are not visible to the customers. This is a security measure for the safety of the employees, and a deterrent to thieves.
See also Bazaar for an Auction House alternative.
Locations
There are four separate Auction House systems in Vana'diel, with one associated to each of the the 4 major cities (Bastok, San d'Oria, Windurst and Jeuno). These Auction House systems can be accessed from the following locations:
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Auction House System |
Access Locations |
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How to Use
The Auction House principle is pretty simple; you set up an item and specify a MINIMUM price you want for the item before it sells (asking price). It is always the item with the lowest asking price that will sell first. In the event of two or more sellers having items up with the same asking price, the one who was put up first will sell first. This encourages a competitive market, though wether or not it works as intended is a hotly debated subject.
There is a transaction fee for items put up on auction which is based on the seller's asking price. The formulas for calculating the transaction fee are listed below.
- Jeuno auction houses
- Single item fee = 2% of the seller's asking price +100 gil.
- Stacked item fee = 1% of the seller's asking price +400 gil.
- Other auction houses
- Single item fee = 1% of the seller's asking price +1 gil.
- Stacked item fee = 0.5% of the seller's asking price +4 gil.
Categories
The Auction House (AH) is divided into a number of sections to make finding the item you're searching for easier. When you target the Auction House and open a "dialogue" with the auctioneer you will be able to navigate to different sections via the menus:
It is in the Bid category that you can spend a good deal of time just browsing around. There are a number of different items and goods that you can purchase here.