Auction House selling in WoW Forever: pricing, deposits and proceeds

Check the item and the price per unit

Make sure the item can be listed, then search for the same item. Check equipment requirements, suffix or variant, and stats before matching another seller's price. Blizzard's October 15 development notes addressed equipment-level display and suffix-item stats in the Auction House. Source: Blizzard's development notes, User Interface.

For materials, put the prices on a per-item basis. In a fictional example, three units at 25s each cost 75s in total. Five units for 1g cost 20s each. The 1g listing has the higher total and the lower price per item.

Read the form before entering your price: does it want a unit price or a total? Then check the item, quantity and final total together. Calculating 20s per item correctly won't help if you enter 20s as the price of the whole bundle.

How much do you want to keep?

Work out the sale proceeds you need after selling costs, leaving any returned deposit out of that amount. For an item bought to resell, this needs to cover the purchase price before you make a profit. For a craft, count the value of all the ingredients used, including materials you gathered. For gathered or looted items, compare the auction return with their other uses and any vendor offer.

Fictional target: you bought an item for 80s and want to make 20s before counting your time. With no earlier selling losses, the sale needs to leave 80s + 20s = 1g after selling costs. If a fee comes out of the sale, a 1g asking price won't be enough. A deposit refund won't make up the difference either; that money was yours before posting.

You need the applicable charges to turn that 1g target into an exact asking price. Use the current quote and your transaction records. Until the charge is known, the exact price needed to reach the target is unknown too.

If the form offers both a starting bid and a buyout, set a starting bid you'd be willing to accept. The buyout is no protection against a sale at the lower bid.

Start with a batch you can leave unsold

Choose a quantity that won't leave you waiting on a buyer to afford your next trip. The items can sit unsold, and the posting charge comes out before any sale pays you.

Think about what a buyer would need. A large bundle may be awkward for someone who only wants ingredients for one craft. Check which quantities the current interface allows before preparing the listing.

Compare durations and quoted deposits together. A longer listing leaves the item at that price for longer. Shorter listings let you reconsider sooner, but several cheap attempts can cost more than one longer attempt. Put a limit on how much more gold you're willing to spend on posting so a returned item doesn't keep collecting charges without a review.

Write down the posting charge

Record the deposit paid when you post. You need that much cash now, even if some or all of it eventually comes back. When the auction ends, record the actual refund alongside it. Whatever isn't returned is the deposit cost of that attempt.

Wowhead reported differences between displayed and charged deposits in earlier pre-release tests. That report doesn't confirm the behavior on the current build. Source: Wowhead's Auction House report.

For a listing you already intend to make, note the item, quantity, duration and displayed charge. Check the wallet immediately before and after posting without other transactions between. If the wallet drops by a different amount, hold off on posting more of the same until you understand the charge.

Read the receipt before counting profit

Match the transaction record or receipt, where available, with the gold that reaches your wallet. Look for the sale proceeds, any fee already withheld and any returned deposit. A receipt can combine proceeds and a refund even though they do different jobs in your calculation.

The deposit refund replaces cash you paid earlier. A commission already withheld has already reduced the proceeds. Adding the refund as profit or subtracting that commission twice gives the wrong answer.

Until the money reaches your wallet, keep it out of the cash available for purchases. You can note a confirmed sale and the expected receipt separately. Once collected, the money is already in the wallet balance; don't add the expected receipt to that balance a second time. Unsold stock stays in the item record.

One item through two attempts

Fictional transaction history: an item costs 80s. The first listing requires a 3s deposit and expires without a refund. A second listing requires another 3s. It sells for 1g 20s; an invented 6s commission is withheld and the second deposit is returned.

Following the wallet gives 117s − 80s − 3s − 3s = 31s. Using net sale proceeds gives the same answer: 114s − 80s purchase cost − 3s lost first deposit = 31s. The 6s commission is already missing from the 114s, and the refunded 3s cancels the second deposit.

You also needed 86s before collecting the receipt: 80s for the item and two 3s deposits. Having enough to post matters even when the sale eventually leaves a profit. The 31s and 86s figures exclude time and costs outside this example.

Before paying to post it again

Compare the returned stock with equivalent listings now available. A listing disappearing from search doesn't prove it sold, so don't use that alone to decide which price buyers will pay.

Before lowering your price, work out what would remain after the new charge. Lowering it may help find a buyer, but it also cuts what you keep. Past fees stay in the item's total record; the next attempt needs judging on its new price and additional costs.

Keep the item, quantity, purchase or ingredient cost, deposits, refunds, net proceeds and unsold quantity together. That lets you answer two different questions: is the item you still own worth listing again, and would you buy or make another batch? Selling the last item can make sense even when repeating the purchase would not.

When you've reached the posting limit you set, check the vendor offer again. The vendor comparison covers taking that cash rather than paying for another attempt.