Auction Selling

From wow.incgamers.com

Placing an item into the in-game auction system.

The third and final tab, called Auctions shows all the auctions you have created [items you are selling] to help you track bidding progress. It is here you also add your items to the auction system. To create an auction simply open your inventory/bag and drag the items into the item slot in the left of the the Auctions interface. Here you can set the price you are looking for by clicking in the small boxes indicated as gold, silver or bronze and entering your amount. Below this is also a box for a 'buyout price'. This is a price you can set and if a bidder meets this price it will automatically be sold to that bidder. Making this price too high will also mean bidders will not be tempted to bid the higher buyout price.

Players are encouraged to set buyout prices since many people often want items immediately when they bid on them, especially trade goods and raw materials, and are often willing to pay a higher price to buy it immediately instead of waiting for the auction to expire.

With this first implementation of the Auction House system a deposit fee was implemented based on a percentage of the amount of money that a vendor would buy the item for. The deposit fee increases as the seller increases the amount of time that the item will be up for auction. - Blizzard July 2004 Selling an item does come at a price, there is a fee that has to be paid into the system to place your auction. The fee deposit is calculated as a percentage of the item's value if sold to a vendor. The fee is also more expensive the longer you set the duration of your sale so it's important you get the balance just right when putting an item up for auction as you want to keep the fee as low as possible. If the item is sold within the allotted time, the seller will have their fee deposit returned via the in-game mail system along with the money from the bidder minus a transaction fee, which is a small percentage of the ultimate sale price. However if the item fails to sell, the seller loses the deposit fee while the item is returned back to the seller via the in-game mail system for retrieval. The item will remain in the mailbox for a maximum of 30 days.

If you are in game when the auction expires, a message will flash across the screen saying your auction has been successful or unsuccessful in yellow text in the middle of the screen.