Vertu auctioned most of its luxury phones, but they remained expensive

Vertu will soon be no more, but before going into oblivion, the UK-based company has to liquidate its assets to pay its bills, as well as the people that worked for the luxury smartphone maker.

For a few days now, Vertu is selling the contents of its UK factory, including all the stuff showcased inside the company's museum (older phones, statues, awards, etc.).

Even though all Vertu smartphones are now being sold by an auction house called G.J. Wisdom & Co., the starting prices are still high enough to make these luxury devices untouchable by the middle-class.

The good news is if you really want a luxury phone that has key numbers instead of a touch screen, you can get a Vertu model relatively cheap, but only if you're lucky. For example, one of Vertu's Signature phones that were launched for £14,700 ($19,000) back in the day, was sold at the auction for £11,200 ($14,500).

However, those looking for unique stuff that few people in the world might be able to get had the chance to grab Vertu's collection of concept devices (105 phones). The opening big for these icon handsets was £20,000 ($26,000), but the collection sold for no less than £133,200 ($172,000).

The “lesser” Vertu phones could be bought for prices slightly higher than £1,000 ($1,300), but that's because they were among the oldest launched by the British company. All in all, it appears that Vertu made quite a lot of money after selling some of its assets, but it's unclear whether or not it will be enough to pay all its bills.