Bashiok announced the gold-based auction house is now available for testing in the Diablo III F&F Beta, and offered some extra details. New patch is already available for download. Check out the patch notes after the quote.

We’ve recently patched the Diablo III Friends & Family beta test to include access to the gold-based auction house.

Friends & Family beta test participants can check out the auction house by clicking on the ‘gavel’ icon at the bottom of the main Battle.net interface seen when first logging into the game.

To sell items, you’ll first need to place anything you want to sell in your character’s inventory, or shared stash. The shared stash can be found near the Slaughtered Calf Inn in New Tristram. Once you’ve placed items in your inventory or stash you’ll be able to choose from the items you’d like to sell in the auction house interface. By placing starting and (optional) buyout prices, you can place your item up for auction. If someone chooses to buy the item, you’ll receive the final sale price, minus any posting fees.

Keep in mind that this is the gold-based auction house only. The currency-based auction house may be available for testing at a later date, and if it is, we’ll have more information on how it will function at that time.

We’re looking for both stability and usability testing, and appreciate your help with buying and selling items to run the system through its paces. If you’d like to provide feedback, please do so by posting in this thread and if you find any bugs please post in the Beta Bug Report forum in this thread.

For an auction house overview and information regarding specific functionality, be sure to check out the services section of the Diablo III community site, here: https://us.battle.net/d3/en/services/ Browse through the auction house section of the site using the multiple tabs at the top for more details, located here

In addition, Bashiok responded a question about percent fee for gold-based Auction House, the flat fee for Real Money Auction House, and other options (not yet set in stone).

Gold auction house takes a percentage. It’s currently 15%, it may stay as that, it may not. Head over to the feedback thread if you think it should be different: https://us.battle.net/d3/en/forum/topic/3196019654 (beta license required)

The plan for the currency based auction house is a flat fee for listing the item and again if it sells. We’re planning to give some amount of free listings. We have not announced what the listing or sale prices are. There is a percentage taken if you choose to cash out with PayPal, and again that hasn’t been announced. If you keep it within your Blizzard eBalance (name to be decided) you can use it to purchase other items in the AH, pay for your WoW sub, buy Heart of the Swarm, etc. etc. with no percentage fee taken. — source

Diablo III F&F Beta Patch 3 v.0.3.0.7338 – Patch Notes

General

  • Public Games are once again available to players. To help us test this automated matchmaking feature, click on “Campaign” and then select “Public Games.”
    • The number of characters playing the selected public quest will now display in the Public Games menu.
  • The Diablo III Auction House is coming soon! During the beta launch of this system, the following features will be enabled:
    • Gold-based equipment exchange.
    • Bid, auto-bid, and buyout functionality.
    • Slot-based search filters.
    • Toast notifications to track auction progress.
    • The ability to put items up for auction directly from the shared stash.