Online auction makes surfing for surplus county equipment a click away

Collin County’s Purchasing Department goes a bit beyond handling bids for new equipment and services for county government. Periodically, they dispose of county surplus items – from “retired” office and computer equipment to vehicles to heavy equipment -- through on-line auctions.

A sampling from a recent auction includes a dump truck, some mobile homes, kitchen equipment, PVC Fittings, a sign machine, tables, chairs, desks and typewriters. That’s right, typewriters.

The auctions are not regularly scheduled, so our folks have made it easier to track what’s for sale and when it’s scheduled through an online auctioneer, with detailed descriptions and photos of what’s for sale, like that ’96 dump truck we mentioned. If you register online, the auctioneer will even send you email updates on upcoming auctions. Inspections of the equipment are by appointment only, but the auction website list days and contact numbers for prospective bidders to make arrangements.

Please make sure you read the fine print for things such as “all items are sold as is.”

One final hint, too: the online auctioneer also handles surplus sales of equipment for governmental agencies and utility companies across North Texas, so if we don’t have what you seek, it won’t be hard to look elsewhere.

Now, who wants to bid on this cute little 20-gallon steam kettle, eh?