star Tim Weeks suffered the humiliation of having an item in auction on the show which couldn’t even raise 50p – despite spending £60 on it. Speaking on a special show to mark the 25th anniversary of the antique hunting gameshow he recalled the incident. He and his team were eyeing up an ice cream cart whch was going for £80.
Having managed to secure it for £60 they brought it to auction but Tim realised tey may not turn a profit as soon as he walked through the door. “I remember Catherine Southon telling me off as I walked in,” he recalled as a clip of the auction in question was played. Despite even asking for 50p for the curio it received no bids leading one of the team to exclaim: “I’m so ashamed!” “No bids and unsold on Bargain Hunt. I made history,” Tim laughed.
Tim Weeks holds the record for spending most on an item that didn’s sell on Bargain Hunt (Image: BBC)
Tim, who joined Bargain Hunt in 2003, may be a renowned antiques expert, but that’s not his only staggering loss at auction during his time on show.
“ was when I ‘blind’ purchased a collection of rock and film star autographs for £220. When they arrived, they were all facsimile and worth about a tenner! Wow, it still hurts,” he confessed.
But sometimes an item can make a surprising profit, and sharing the greatest profit he made on the show, Tim revealed how he turned a £40 scrapbook into a £1,000 profit.
The TV presenter went on: “I once found an old scrapbook containing 1940s football newspaper cuttings at a car boot sale. I asked how much it was and was told £40.
“It felt a little steep for a dirty old scrapbook until I flicked to the back pages, which had 21 wartime single sheet football programmes neatly stuck onto them, and I quickly realised it was a bargain.
“It also had match tickets, bubble gum cards and autographs. I sold it for over £1,000 after I performed the painstaking task of steaming each item out of the book,” he revealed.
Altough he loves the show, he has also confessed that he tries not to bring home any antiques home anymore. Tim explained: “I try not to [collect anything] anymore!
“I used to collect loads… football programmes, toys, vinyl, ceramics, but I tend to spend my money on the kids instead of me these days.” Away from the cameras, Weeks is also the director of Wessex Auction Rooms, which boasts a particular focus on Toy Collector’s Auctions.