[Joeaksa]

I buy and sell a lot on Ebay. The way to do a large ticket item is to put your beginning bid at $99 or so. Then put a reserve that you feel comfortable with and your min price. When an auction has the starting bid high too many people are put off with the high price.

Once someone gets bidding THEN they get hooked and will drive the price higher. Will it get to your reserve? Who knows but if you want $12k and start the auction at $11.9k you are going to eliminate about 80% of your bidders. Once you get the hook in them, then they usually drive the bid up.

I am just as fast as the automated services. I have a triple screen setup on my home computer and put the auction page on two screens. On one I put my highest bid and hit the "continue" button but do not confirm it. The second screen with a copy of the same page on it is refreshed ever 20 seconds or so to watch for activity. If I see more bidders in the last few seconds all I have to do is to hit the "confirm" key and try to outbid them.

Why do this? I have used the automated systems and it usually ended up with my spending more than if I had done it myself. If I just put a high bid in at the first place then the automated program (and everyone) can figure out what my max is and have a chance to outbid me. Doing it at the last few seconds gives me a better chance of winning at a lower price.

When selling check the bidders feedback. If its less than 100 I get nervous. Less than 50 and its not good and I check the auctions that they have bid on in the past. Same with sellers and if someone does not have 100% feedback I want to know why and if its something screwy I buy elsewhere. Just not worth the problems and the two issues I have had over 6 years on Ebay have both been with a seller with several negative reports in their feedback.

Also, I ALWAYS put a bid in early on. Really hate people who "snipe" and never bid but try to outbid everyone at the last second. If everyone does not know how much interest there is in an item you have no idea if its popular or not.

Last thing. Never email a seller asking if they want to sell an item after the auction has ended. Ebay has a dim view of this and will suspend you. Email them and ask if they will "relist" the item. That way they can email you back and ask if you are interested. Never use the "Ebay" email system for the reply but email directly now that you have their personal email address. That way you can deal directly if you wish.

Joe A