NEED TO KNOW
Jade Shenker, a 30-year-old internet personality and real estate agent, found herself in the center of a viral saga earlier this summer when she bought a used Hermès bag online
She found the bag, which had been on her vision board for months, while browsing Facebook Marketplace
But Shenker was shocked, she tells PEOPLE, when she got the bag authenticated
Jade Shenker doesn’t think of herself as a big luxury bag collector.
The 30-year-old internet personality and real estate agent — who was featured on Netflix’s reality series Owning Manhattan — tells PEOPLE that, as she’s gotten older, she likes to focus her wardrobe and bag collection on a smaller number of “quality pieces.” But earlier this summer, she found herself in the center of a viral saga that involved Facebook Marketplace, a used Hermès crocodile bag and a shocking meeting with an authenticator.
The story actually starts way back in February.
Shenker, who calls herself a “big manifester,” likes to change her phone’s lock screen to a collage of items on her vision board. And that month, in one of the many squares on her phone screen, she put a black Hermès crocodile Kelly bag.
Jade ShenkerCredit: Jade Shenker/instagram
“I’ve always wanted a Croc,” she tells PEOPLE. “I think it’s so chic. It’s like, you never need another black bag ever again if you have a black Croc.”
In July, Shenker was just browsing Facebook Marketplace listings when she stumbled across the exact bag on her vision board. She immediately messaged the seller, who was based in New York City’s Upper East Side neighborhood, and arranged for the bag to be sent to her apartment in an Uber.
In their messages, Shenker and the seller settled on a price — she is coy when asked for specifics, but she assures PEOPLE it was less than the bag’s value if it turned out to be authentic Hermès — and agreed that she would purchase the bag if she could get it independently authenticated.
Jade ShenkerCredit: Jade Shenker/instagram
And sure enough, the next day, an Uber car arrived at her apartment with the Hermès bag of her dreams inside. Still, Shenker was not convinced that it was authentic Hermès, so she scheduled an appointment with FASHIONPHILE, an authenticator in New York City, to see for herself.
“I went into FASHIONPHILE 100% thinking that it was fake,” she admits. “I was like, ‘This is such a funny bit. This is embarrassing.’ I prepped myself for the mental embarrassment of being in a room and having people be like, ‘Oh yeah, it’s fake.’ ”
But in a moment captured for her social media accounts — and viewed thousands and thousands of times — the authenticator told her the bag was real and a vintage 1960s model. Shenker’s jaw dropped when she learned the news.
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Now that she knows she has a Hermès piece in her collection, her next step is to get the bag appraised to have a sense of its value. That price, she tells PEOPLE, will partially inform how frequently she wears it out — since she always intended to buy the bag for daily wear, but admits she might “need to buy another one” if the original is truly a rare collectible item.
Jade ShenkerCredit: Jade Shenker/instagram
Ever since the success of her bag experience, Shenker, who says she identifies as a “shopaholic,” has been on a Facebook Marketplace kick: She toyed around, for instance, with buying the Vera Wang dress that Carrie Bradshaw wore for a bridal shoot in Sex and the City because it was in her size and the price was good. (She ultimately didn’t, since she has no plans to get married anytime soon, and she would prefer the gown to go to an actual bride.)
Who’s to say what her next big purchase might be? Says Shenker: “It’s been a rollercoaster.”
Read the original article on People