PublicSurplus Government Surplus Auction Scraper

Scrapes government surplus auction listings from PublicSurplus, a marketplace where US and Canadian government agencies — states, counties, cities, school districts, and universities — sell surplus vehicles, equipment, electronics, and other assets. Returns one structured record per lot, covering every browse category, with agency, location, bid, and closing-price data.

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PublicSurplus Scraper Features

• Covers all 28 top-level PublicSurplus browse categories — vehicles, heavy equipment, computers, electronics, furniture, industrial gear, medical, real estate, and more
• Returns the selling government agency and pick-up location (city + state) alongside every lot, so results join cleanly against other government-surplus datasets
• Captures current bid, bid count, and — for lots whose auction ends during the crawl — the closing price
• Filter by one or more categories, or leave blank to crawl everything
• Supports resuming a large run that stopped early, without re-paying for records you already have

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Who Uses PublicSurplus Data?

• Surplus resellers and flippers sourcing inventory — heavy equipment, fleet vehicles, IT hardware, lab and AV gear
• Municipal-fleet remarketers tracking what government agencies are offloading and at what price
• Asset-recovery and liquidation firms building comparables from realized sale prices
• Market researchers studying government surplus disposal patterns across US states and Canadian provinces

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Input

{
  "maxItems": 100,
  "categories": ["17", "4"]
}

Field	Type	Default	Description
maxItems	integer	10	Required. Maximum number of auction lots to return.
categories	array of strings	all 28	PublicSurplus category ids to crawl (e.g. 17 = Heavy Equipment, 4 = Motor Pool). Leave empty for all categories.

Category ids

Id	Category	Id	Category
1	Computers	16	Clothing
2	Electronics	17	Heavy Equipment
3	Office Equipment	18	Collectibles
4	Motor Pool	19	Aviation
5	Sporting Goods	20	Marine
6	Industrial Equipment	21	Motor Pool Parts
8	Food Supply	22	Airport
9	School Supplies	23	Medical
10	Building	24	Animals and Livestock
11	Jewelry	25	Scrap
12	Outdoor Equipment	26	Storage
13	Music and Arts	27	Housewares
14	Furniture	28	For Children
15	Real Estate	29	Heavy Equipment Parts

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Output Fields

{
  "auction_id": "4063975",
  "title": "SUM1500RMXL2U APC battery backup",
  "category": "Electronics",
  "category_id": 2,
  "agency_name": "Show Low Unified School District",
  "agency_region": "AZ",
  "location_city": "Show Low",
  "location_state": "AZ",
  "current_bid_usd": 50,
  "bid_count": 0,
  "starting_bid_usd": 50,
  "time_left_raw": "4 hours 6 mins",
  "ends_at": "2026-08-21T19:00:00.000Z",
  "quantity": null,
  "condition": "UNKNOWN",
  "description": "SUM1500RMXL2U APC battery backup untested",
  "thumbnail_url": "https://d37qv0n5b4mbzm.cloudfront.net/sms/docviewer/cdnmainaucdoc/thumb-b/4063975/70982201",
  "image_urls": ["https://d37qv0n5b4mbzm.cloudfront.net/sms/docviewer/cdnmainaucdoc/thumb-b/4063975/70982201"],
  "detail_url": "https://www.publicsurplus.com/sms/auction/view?auc=4063975",
  "is_closed": false,
  "sold_price_usd": null,
  "scraped_at": "2026-08-21T14:53:45.907Z"
}

Field	Type	Description
auction_id	string	PublicSurplus lot identifier
title	string	Lot title
category	string	Category name
category_id	integer	Category id
agency_name	string	Selling government agency
agency_region	string	State/province badge shown on the lot's listing card
location_city	string	Pick-up location city
location_state	string	Pick-up location state/province
current_bid_usd	number	Current bid price in USD
bid_count	integer	Number of bids placed so far
starting_bid_usd	number	Opening bid, populated when the lot has zero bids so far
time_left_raw	string	Time-left text as shown on the listing
ends_at	string	Auction close time, ISO 8601
quantity	string	Quantity, where the listing discloses one
condition	string	Item condition, as reported by the seller
description	string	Full lot description
thumbnail_url	string	Primary lot image URL
image_urls	array	Lot image URLs
detail_url	string	Direct link to the lot on PublicSurplus
is_closed	boolean	Whether the auction had ended at scrape time
sold_price_usd	number	Closing price, populated when the lot closed during the crawl
scraped_at	string	ISO-8601 timestamp of when the record was captured

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Resuming a large crawl

Every run emits a resumeCursor in its Output. If a large crawl stops before it finishes — because it hit maxItems, your spend cap (maxTotalChargeUsd), or was aborted — start a new run with the same input plus that resumeCursor to continue from where it left off. The crawl resumes from the queued work the previous run didn't reach.

• You are not re-charged for records the earlier run already delivered.
• Resume within your account's run-retention window — on the free tier, roughly your 10 most recent runs. Once the source run is pruned, its resumeCursor is no longer valid.
• resumeCursor is opaque — supply it unmodified.

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FAQ

How do I scrape PublicSurplus auctions?

Set maxItems and, optionally, categories — leave categories blank to cover every category. Run the actor; it returns one record per auction lot.

Can I get just one category, like heavy equipment or vehicles?

Yes. Set categories to any subset of the ids listed above.

Does this include auctions that have already closed?

Live auctions are the primary coverage. A lot that closes while its page is being crawled is captured as closed with its final sale price (is_closed: true, sold_price_usd populated) — this is opportunistic, not a guaranteed archive of every closed lot on the site.

How much does this cost to run?

Pay-per-event pricing — you pay per lot record returned. Exact per-event pricing is shown on the actor's Apify page before you run.

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Why Use This Scraper?

• Whole-site coverage — every browse category in one actor, not a single-category slice
• Normalised agency + location fields — join cleanly against other government-surplus datasets
• Resumable — a large full-catalog pull can pick up where it left off without duplicate charges