S&L; Bust Means Boom for Miami Auctioneer : Liquidations: With his company now selling off the assets of failed thrifts for the Resolution Trust Corp., slow or lean periods are going, going, gone.

The worst of times could be the best of times for Jim Gall and his auctioneers.

With the nation’s savings and loan system in shambles and regulators anxious to unload seized assets, Gall said his 11-year-old auction house is poised for profits and fame.

“I’m as upset about the S&L; crisis as anyone. We’re all in for thousands of dollars per person for the bailout,” said Gall, chairman of Miami-based Auction Co. of America. “But around here, we couldn’t be busier.”

Gall--part savvy executive, part slick showman--is striving to become the principal gavel-basher for the Resolution Trust Corp., the agency established last year to dispose of insolvent thrifts. It appears his quest is paying off.

Last month in Miami, Gall raked in more than $300,000 for the RTC in an auction of dinnerware and other luxury items from the failed CenTrust Savings Bank. More than 1,000 bidders filled a marble hall in the CenTrust tower to compete for items such as a rare book collection and the personal mahogany humidor of ousted CenTrust Chairman David Paul.

Gall’s next big RTC auction appearance is planned for early fall, when he will bring about $300 million in commercial properties to the block. Bidders from around the nation and in Tokyo and London will participate via a special satellite hookup.

With auction-company commissions ranging between 5% and 10%, Gall’s firm stands to make millions off the real estate sale--billed by Gall as “the largest auction in the history of the world.” He said he plans to ask for recognition in the “Guinness Book of World Records.”

“Yeah, but we also look at it as the taxpayers’ gain as well,” he said. “The better price we get for the properties, the less the taxpayers’ burden for the bailout.”

During a recent interview in Gall’s office, the telephone rang. It was the RTC calling from Washington. Gall slumped into his leather chair.

“Today?” he asked, gazing out the window at a 23rd-floor view of the Atlantic Ocean. “All right, we’ll be ready.”

Gall put down the receiver and winced. The RTC was preparing to release a list of the 100 to 125 properties in the fall auction and wanted to use Auction Co. of America as a contact number for the press.

“This kind of took me by surprise. We don’t even have a special phone ready,” Gall said. “But hey, life’s full of surprises.”

Gall, 44, is no stranger to the unexpected. He and the company’s senior vice president arrived unannounced in Washington last year. They were loaded down with 50-page information packets designed to persuade congressmen to include auctions in S&L; bailout legislation.

But few lawmakers took interest in the pair, who would show up in offices without appointments and ambush congressional aides. Finally, the two gave up and dumped the folders.

“Besides, they weighed too much,” said Gall.

But before they left town, they typed a one-page position paper that caught the attention of U.S. Rep. Doug Bereuter (R-Neb.), who sponsored a successful auction amendment.

The RTC will watch the response to the fall auction before deciding whether to use Gall or other companies for future nationwide auctions, said agency spokeswoman Nancy Schertzing.

“I would not doubt it if we see other auctions,” she said. “We’re still taking assets under RTC control.”

As of mid-July, the RTC had 247 thrifts under conservatorship and had sold or liquidated 209 others, she said.

“This S&L; crisis has turned out to be a wonderful opportunity for the auction industry,” said Ann Wood, executive vice president of the 740-member Certified Auctioneers Institute in Overland Park, Kan. “It’s showing the nation that auctions are a way to dispose of property quickly and efficiently. . . . People are learning there’s more to being an auctioneer than just being able to talk fast.”

But Gall talks fast anyway. A sign in his office reads “Do It Now.”

In the early 1970s, he peddled office furniture and novelties such as key chains before his first taste--or whiff--of the big time.

Working with special, highly concentrated oils developed by Minnesota Mining & Manufacturing Co., Gall and his sister developed scratch-and-sniff T-shirts in a Miami kitchen in 1976.

The T-shirts--a short-lived fad--had a moment of national fame when former ABC sportscaster Alex Karras donned one during a “Monday Night Football” broadcast from Miami. Gall had tracked down the broadcast’s co-anchor, Howard Cosell, earlier in the day to give him the shirt.

“The T-shirts went up, then down and out of sight,” said Gall. “But it taught me how to do national and international marketing. It taught me how to think big.”