The auction house gets a half million for their trouble so that is a nice take for 5 minutes worth of work.
I am assuming the auction fee is 30%. I don’t know first hand. Just saying, the guy did great, but it must be nice to run an auction house that does nothing but bring together buyers and sellers and skims all the cream off the top.
If the auction house had only put in five minutes’ of work here, 1. it would be the laughing-stock of the industry, and 2. it would not be in business very much longer.
If auctioneering like that is such a great and easy biz, there’ll be plenty more houses in and willing to trim the percentage on payments.