I've also gotten plenty of stuff when the reserve was not met and I contacted the seller to make another offer. Plenty of great Porsche, BMW and Breitling stuff on the German eBay will not ship to the US. I always contact the seller and ask if they'll work with me. They almost always say yes and I've never had a problem.

It's a game, it has rules (ends at a certain time), you play by the rules... figure out how to win, and at what price you want to win, or pass.

Learned a valuable lesson several years ago, got in a three way bidding war for something for my Grand Cherokee and lost - was number two. Next day number three emailed me saying that we'd all bid way more than the dealer charged. Called the dealer; he was correct.

If there's no shipping price listed, I email the seller and ask for a price to ship to my zip. If he gives it, I bring it up before I pay. If he won't, I probably won't bid unless he says 'actual' costs.

If someone's selling say, a quart oil for $4.95 and is charging almost $10 for shipping per quart... well... that's just nuts...

I've probably saved 50K by being "sniped"

When your dealing with everyday commodities e-bay ain't so swift. One has to be very carefull to not over pay. I like to buy books on spoons, I always check ABE book exchange for pricing first.

For example. I have been looking for a book called "Kentucky Patchboxes and Barrel Markings vol 1" Limited printing of 1500 copies circa 1972.

One showed up on E-bay France with several other spoon books sold for $104 US plus shipping $25?

Another that I bid on went for 167.00 plus shipping

One sold on Live Bid which also is a brick and mortar auction.(went to floor bidder)..for $275

One is listed at $185 plus shipping

One sold for $130.00 plus shipping on ABE

I bought the 2 volume set for $250 on ABE....

The remaining copies on ABE are at $350 for vol 2 and $375 for vol 1 & 2.


BTW These transactions all occured in the last 3 weeks.

I've probably saved 50K by being "sniped"

What I really watch e-bay for is Art and Sterling Silver. I recently bought a Porter Blanchard Creamer and Sugar Bowl that I have been watching e-bay for 5 years to show up....$310.00. Which was reasonable.

I also have sold Art and Silver on the bay.

The point being how does one price a one of kind item?

With Art I watch the price in the last hour..then I figure I have to double that price and add 20% or so to be competitive. Then there still are no guarntees.

Several years back I saw a beautiful CA Desert scene by Perry McNeely. It orginally sold on the bay for $500. Next I saw it sell at Morans in Pasadena, CA for $3000. Then it returned to the bay and sold for $4300. All within 6 months.

BTW: With regards to pricing art there are several online services that post Auction results. Auction results are what determines the value range for paticular artists work. Without those results art has a basic decorator value.

I'll usually put a bid that I'd like to pay early on, but then I'll wait and snipe at the end.

Putting in your max can get you screwed. I was bidding on something once, put in a max bid, and then I'm pretty sure that the seller used a second acct or a friend to run the bid up to my max.

IE current price $25
I'm willing to pay $80 so I put a bid in for $80
Another bidder comes along, puts in a bid for $40, then $50, then $75, and then $100. My bid keeps trumping theirs and going up until it hits its max of $80.

The mystery bidder then retracts their last bid with the explanation "accidentally bid too high".
Besides me and the mystery bidder, the only other bids stopped at about $30.
After that, I'm stuck with my $80 max, which I was willing to pay, but at the same time, I'm sure that the seller or a friend wanted to run my bid up to max to maximize their profits.

I quit adding my absolute max unless I'm sure that there's a good chance that I could be out bid by other legitimate bidders.

Absolutely agree with what has been said here, and sniping is the only way to go and that is how the game works. That being said, however, I don't agree with the Max Bid approach. The problem with that is you would ALMOST ALWAYS be willing to pay one penny more than the person who outbid you by one penny. The only ways to combat that is via sniping, or as Wayne mentioned, leaving the auctions open if there is late bidding. Given the rules, sniping is the only answer, which indeed makes it more about poker (or maybe roulette) than shopping.


JA

There is no such thing as "sniping" on ebay, there are just people who understand ebay and people who don't. It's a silent auction. You can put in your maximum bid early or late, but it's foolish to put it in early. No advantage to it and you are tipping your hand to someone willing to pay 10 cents more. It is no longer a silent auction when you put bids in early or keep upping your bid, that's just dumb.

First of all, I'm not going to know if it's even worth it to bid until very near the end. If it's already above what I'm willing to pay, what's the point?

Ebay is great. It's free-market capitalism at it's most unregulated. It doesn't matter whether it's stores selling new stuff or people selling crap. It's a free market.

Sniping, for the purposes of discussing ebay, is the practice of timing your bid such that others do not have the opportunity to place a bid after yours.

It doesn't matter. If they put in a higher max bid 5 minutes before me, they win.

They just cannot change their max bid after they see mine, because the auction is now over. The only way something can be unfair in this world is if I have the opportunity to do something on eBay that you do not. That is not the case.

I agree.

I never understand why people put in a bid when there are 6 days left in the auction. I like it when I'm the seller, but I don't understand it. Bidding early, then upping your bid, is just bidding against yourself.

I disagree with this approach. If you simply bid through Ebay you are driving the price up. Many people simply get caught up in the action and drive the price up above its value. If you play it smart in this scenario - you still lose. However, if you snipe, it's one less bidder driving up the price. Less experienced Ebayers (like Jim :)) will still bid way too early, but the price will (often times) stay lower than it's value. At the end, your snipe will either go uncontested because the "Jims" out there can't react, or you will go head to head with another Ebay savvy sniper. In that case, the highest bid wins. However, that guy is also using his head so he won't run the price up on emotion, so again, you have a better chance of succeding. I ALWAYS use bidnapper.

Another benefit to sniping - you can change your mind at the last minute and cancel.

But don't listen to me. I don't need more educated Ebay competition. ;)

Of course, you don't put your max bid until there are only 10 seconds or less left in the auction. I thought that was a given.

I guess I'd agree, but I think the terms need a little fixing.

"Sniper" should be taken out of the lexicon.

People who do not put any bid in the auction until the last 5-10 seconds, and then put in their best and highest bid at that time, are called "Normal sensible bidders."

Everyone else is called . . . I don't know, something else.

That's too much work!:) I just assumed most people did the bid-rebid at max thing.

The way you're doing it makes sense if you have the time. Sniping just simplifies my life. I see something I like - I load my max bid - later I see if I won. Sometimes I even forget and find out a day later I owe someone some money. It costs a buck a snipe. No big deal considering the amount of $$ I've funneled into crap I really don't need.

It all depends on whether you are buying or selling.

If I am selling, I want lots of people bidding their max early, driving up the price. An items with 3 days to go and 8 bids already catches other peoples attention. Having a large number of people watching an items is also a good guide to expect some last minute frenzy.

If I am buying I want to win with the lowest activity and without attracting attention to the item. So I always snipe - no point in giving anyone else a chance to counter my bid. If I win, good for me - if I lose, I've done the seller a favour and pushed up the price for him.

We have an Auction site in Australia called Grays Online - great for wine and jewelry liquidations as well as lots of other things. Its auctions only stop after the target finish time it it soes not receive any more bids on an item - I think it waits 10 minutes.

Tim

Anyone ever get set up to snipe an auction only to find out that no one else even bidded.:p Such a let down. I have almost never won an auction that I put an early reasonabe bid in. I have put the same bid in last second and usually win the item. Too many out there interested in winning the auction rather then getting a good deal.

I didn't read through all of the responses so someone might have had the same experience.

I bid on a car several weeks ago and I would bet a good chunk of change that the seller had one of his buddies run the bid up. I got a 2nd chance offer from the seller about a day after the auction closed and I sent him an email asking what happened to the winning bidder. He didn't flame the buyer for backing out and he never called me back. The sad part about it was the guy bought the car two years ago and he told me (over the phone prior to the end of the auction) what he paid for the car and my final bid was almost 8 % more than what he paid for the car. My bid was a little higher than mkt value and I was willing to pay a little more for the car. As far as I know he didn't re-list the car (on ebay).

You hit the nail on the head. For some, it becomes a competition. For others it's an impulse buy. Again, that's why I use bidnapper. It removes the emotion from the deal plus I can change my mind. I'm not grown up enough to walk away from a fight so auctions are bad for me. However, Ebay is a great resource for some things I collect so I adapted.