George Costopulos Auctioneers & George & Co Estate

He was a very nice and knowledgeable person. I could tell he has a lot of valuable information!

I hired George to sell the contents of my aunts estate because he was the most professional and knowledgeable of all the the estate sale companies and numerous dealers who I interviewed, . My aunt's estate had many quality antiques, jewelry, and household furnishing and I wanted the right company that would know what these items were worth and would have the following to get good prices. In the course of my research I found that George had been in the estate sale & antiques auction business for over 30 years and came highly recommended on many levels. He was written up in the Boston Globe antique section on many occasions and the national antiques paper "the arts and antiques weekly". I felt, at this point with such a wide experence in selling fine antiques and household items George would be the right estate company. He came to my aunt’s estate and went threw everything and found items that I thought were junk and I had planed to through away. Thank goodness he had the knowlege to recognize their value because he got a lot of money for these items. After George looked at everything, he photographed all the pieces that he thought would attract buyers to the sale and made a page on his website dedicated to my sale and it came out beautifully. He sent out over 2000 emails from his list of people who had attended and purchased items from pervious estate sales and auctions and also advertised on estate sale .org, which send out over 12,000 emails. He also advertised on Craig’s list. Prior to the sale he came to my aunts home and organized everything and set up jewelry cases with lights and by time he was finished the place looked like a show room. He schedule the sale on Saturday from 9am to about 2pm. The day of the sale there was over 100 people waiting outside. It was a bit chaotic at first but George and his crew handled the crowd with ease. After the sale, George explained that letting the whole crowd in, is a good strategy because it creates a buying pressure. He said people feel other people are looking over there shoulder wanting to buy the item they are looking at so they pay the price that George wants and everything goes very quickly. He also said that the people who come early have all the big money and are highly motivated to buy. Sounds complicated but he was right. George had five workers besides himself and they were very helpful and curtious, bring furniture and other items to peoples cars. The sale has a steady flow of people after the hectic first 2 hours with people buying items all day long and by the time he was finished most everything was gone and he made us a pile of money. I was so thankful we hired george to do this sale. Everything went perfectly without a hitch as he predicted. He is truly a professional and I have recommended him several times.

I give George a five star review. He was extremely professional and did an outstanding job advertising the sale. Unfortunately the day of the sale was freezing rain and snow, which resulted in a smaller that expected turn-out. George was responsive and offered to do an email blast to over 2000 contact and let them know the sale would repeat the following day. George returned the following day and stayed for four hours to supervise the sale. George has a strong following and the estate sale was very successful. My entire family is very grateful for the excellent service provided.

I have found George to be ethical, honest and professional in his business dealings. I’ve gone to many of his auctions and estate sales over the years. He is skilled at valuation and setting “realistic” fair prices at his estate sales. George did an estate sale for one of our friends in Bolton. She was very satisfied. His goal for estate sales is to accomplish in one day – what other vendors drag out to two or three days with initial unreasonable and uncompromising prices. The homeowner is then stuck with a lot of unsold items at the end —She wasn't. His sales are good for the buyers and the sellers. I highly recommend him to both.

George has the best services out there. Very honest and knowledgeable on the trade. I watched him deal with transactions where he refused low bids for quality antiques so the owner got the most return for their items. You can not find a better company.

It was a very disheartening and disturbing experience. He behaved shamelessly, disrespectfully and with belligerence. I had hired him for a "service". I feel responsible to write this review as a warning to others since I had used Angie's List in making my decision. George was to do a one day sale from 9-4 on a Saturday. He agreed to a percentage that once hired he was not satisfied with. I increased it 10% and he still behaved in a moody, snyde and surly manner. I asked him what was wrong and to discuss and work it out before the sale and he refused. He advertised it incorrectly on Craigslist as a two day sale so I found a man in my house the day before. He had slipped in as I went out the basement to put out the trash. When I told George he blamed the man and wouldn't acknowledge his error or agree to remedy it. This behavior reminded me that on the first day he had come to give me a consultation and estimate he had misplaced his bag and then phoned me and was accusing me of having it. When he found he had it he never apologized for blaming me. On the day of the Estate Sale he arrived at 8 am with five family members and two friends. He brought with him my jewelry priced that he had taken home days before to price on his own time. I had never heard of that so told him I was trusting him and he said his incentive was to make me money so he could make more money. I didn't get a chance to see what he charged. He also asked that all expensive items be placed up close to him by the front. I had thought we would have a final hour to prepare together before letting the people in to begin the sale. I had stayed up most of the night staging and preparing in that he had not wanted to do that work. During this morning he pressured me to start early as I was trying to make sure we were fully prepared. I tried to take him around the house to tour and prepare. I again asked him who would be watching the different areas of the house. Instead of answering he complained about having to pay people and what that would cost him. His friends were using the bathroom, he was engaged with them and people at the front door were wanting to get in early. He was not supporting me in my efforts. He seemed disinterested in making sure all was prepared and was condescendingly telling me I needed to relax. He was doing this in front of his friends and family and I couldn't believe I was being treated this way in my own home. Throughout the day I watched the upstairs of the sale to make sure no one entered my bedroom, office or bathroom. At 3 pm I discovered when he chose to leave the sale an hour early, that items from one closet I had told him was where I was putting everything I did not want sold, had been cleaned out. I was devastated. I didn't know if it was stolen or he had sold it. He just said he could get me some other power tools at estate sales to replace and just left. He went to pay me and wanted me to count already counted stacked bills. His wife who had watched the money had left earlier without saying goodbye. I asked him why no one was watching the area where these objects were or even if they made it to the register why he then sold them when I had said I did not want them sold. They were power tools I needed for my art work, silver and beaded jewelry making supplies, sacred irreplaceable items from spiritual teachers in Tibet and Nepal ( I had just shown him these items the day before and explained that I was putting all objects I did not want sold as well as my personal papers in the closet. At this time he also started pulling things out of places in my art studio over my shoulder from behind when I had told him I did not want items sold. He is a large man. I was shocked by his grabbing behavior. He was angry and wanted more items to sell. He did not compensate me for the cost of replacing any of these items from the closet that he sold (@1000). In addition, throughout the day he had started saying that the sale was not that big although there was an endless stream of people and hundreds of items were leaving my house watching it all go. I knew the numbers were not adding up but I was so shocked by the items gone from the closet that I was unable to think clearly in that moment. I was actually in tears it was so violating. The following day I asked him to help me understand the accounting since he had written nothing down and would only give me the prices on 28 out of hundreds of items sold (7 pages I ultimately itemized by category that I made up and offered him to review.) He had accurately advertised many items to attract people to the sale but then couldn't remember numbers after the sale. He had said that the total of the sale was 5235 and I would received 4192. The numbers did not make logical sense between the amount left after the numbers he had given me and the remaining items unaccounted for. He became belligerent when I asked him to help me understand his accounting. Fortunately I had asked a friend to sit as a witness with me and put it the call on speakerphone. George seemed very interested in learning the value of the Tibetan Ritual items that were sold from the closet without my consent. I explained to him that that was not the point of this conversation. I went to the police and consulted with them. They referred me to a consumer office of the DA. I also consulted with them about my rights. I told George I didn't want to but I was going to police if this was not remedied. A week later he recalled a check he had forgotten in his pocket for $1820. He deducted 20% and sent me the remainder. In addition, the amount he told me the sale made appeared to be half the amount of the pricing I accounted for using his pricing method for the number of items unaccounted for. My conservative total was 10,646. This was estate market value based on his pricing not fair market as I had expected I would take a loss from an estate sale. I shared my conservative accounting and offered to review his accounting and discuss the matter so I could understand how he came to the amount he claimed was the Total sales. He refused to discuss or offer an accounting. The police have explained that this is typical bully behavior and I have consulted with the DA's consumer office and the police and have filed a police report and a detective will follow up as well as potential court. I have been left shortchanged thousands of dollars that he refuses so far to account for. On the same day I sold items with another Auction house in a sale online and had a very professional respectful experience. I found this experience deeply disheartening in that he had initially behaved as someone who admired my travel background and all the objects in my home and jokingly said he would like to go with me on my travels. He bought a guitar from me, I thought I was hiring a kindred spirit that valued art and antiques and artists that would honor my family's belongings and then I found this mood change and behavior quite shocking. I felt he behaved in a very unprofessional manner. I have never left a poor review for anyone before. I felt responsible to warn others especially family members of a deceased relative or elderly people. For me this was the estate of two parents that passed of cancer and I myself am a survivor trying to move on. I made a big mistake trusting this man. It is a rude awakening. I hope my writing this review helps others avoid this type of experience. I have included photos of a small sampling of items of hundreds sold to show the quality of items.

George did a great job selling the remains of my parents home that they had lived in for over 35 years. There was a lot of stuff to be sold, and not all of it was terribly valuable, but I do feel like he got market value or better for what was sold. He honestly made us about double what I thought we would make, so we were pleased.

Everything happened so quickly that we aren't sure what happened. They send in a bunch of people and put ads out. Then a bunch of people come in and take things away for a small amount of money. They emptied the house. I didn't want to spend a year trying to sell everything, so he came in and sold everything for me.

George seemed so nice and very informative on the phone.  Asked for me to email photo's , which I did immediately and never heard back from him .

Despite it being early February, George predicted a large crowd and boy was he right! Because of his large data base of customers, and other ads/signs, many people came. We were pleased at how much (and what!) sold. His estimate of total earned was accurate, although we were more interested in emptying the house than earning money. George is paid by taking a percent of this total. George appeared to have a lot of experience running these sales and knowledge of goods (i.e., silver, jewelry, china, furniture) and prices. He spent quite a bit of time at the house prior to the sale organizing things, taking photos, and appraising certain items. When we asked for a contract, his insurance paperwork, and a receipt he was prompt in providing them. I would use George again if I ever have to downsize!

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George recognized the value of the art glass piece and got a very good price at auction.  His commission was 30% which was very fair.  He came to the house and discussed the auction and also provided guidance  on how to liquidate my mother's home.  Owing to different ideas within the family,  we did a self-run estate sale instead of going with George.  We were absolutely not up to the task.   NEVER TRY TO RUN YOUR OWN ESTATE SALE.  GO TO A PROFESSIONAL.  You have no idea how stressful it is to run your own sale, and I'm sure we would have had a greater profit, if we had gone to George.  He is very nice, knowledgeable, and fair.  What else could you want?

he left the house after paying for about seven items but had tucked a box with costume jewelry under his arm that was not part of what we had agreed to sell. When we discovered the "error" after he had left we called him but he would not return the items or let us "buy" them back.

We have not set a time yet, but are working on it, I was called for this review by Angie's List and have not had any work performed yet.

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It went beautifully.  He did an excellent job, was very professional, had a large crowd and was totally honest.  I would definitely reccomend him to my friends (and have!)

George was very professional in his appraisal of my estate and in the setup of the sale.
The sale was well advertised and brought in a large crowd.
Many items were sold which i did not think i could sell and i was very satisfied in the final amount the sale brought.
George conducted the sale with a friendly attitude and good humor.

I was not going to go down this road, but as I've received a number of requests from you to review this service, here goes.  It was one of the worst experiences of my life!  Nothing was priced by this man; there were no price stickers anywhere to be found.  It was a free-for-all during the sale; even the half full bottle of hand soap and a partial roll of paper towels disappeared from the kitchen. There was no accounting at all of the money being taken in; no record of what was sold and for how much.  At the end of the sale, with no records of anything, I was handed $885.00 and was told this was my profit from selling an entire house of furniture, dishes, antique prints, Hummels, etc.  After he left, two women came by, and I was able to sell (on my own) a table and chairs, a vintage dress and a few old greeting cards for $100.  If I can sell a few items for $100, it baffled me that I only netted $885.00 from this man's professional sale of an entire houseful of goods.

very nice- responded to my phone call professionally.

He was very knowledgeable. He came to my home promptly.  He was very good. I would recommend him.  I plan on using his services in the fall.

the sale on April 6 had very high-end items so there were many dealers and resellers as well as folks buying for themselves. Although very crowded, eventually a line formed so that George could price the items. At this sale, the line was very long but at most sales check-out is very smooth.

George responded to my inquiry email quickly, and we made an appointment for a couple of days later for him to appraise what I had. He was friendly, knowledgeable, honest about changes in the market, and his long-term experience as both an appraiser and former auctioneer was very helpful. He gave me excellent  advice about how to proceed, didn't charge for an hour-plus consultation, and remained upbeat and personable throughout. He has a good sense of humor to boot.

Prompt response, willing to help, and didn't charge for the information.