You're Screwing Up My eBay!

As you said, I think the key is knowing how much you are willing to spend on an item. Then don’t exceed that amount. A similar item will likely show up later.

-- Maplewood, MN

yah the nerve of people outbidding you on your item!! hmph :)

-- "Functional WoodArt" by Debbie, Canada (http://www.execulink.com/~yohan)

I use to sell on ebay and I’m a fan of the bid early and bid often. To me it is a little silly when there is 5 bids in the last minute. Works out great for the buyer, but the seller is the one that is going to pack up what you just bought. I don’t know. I have stopped doing much of anything on ebay. To much hassle.

Someone, somewhere, is typing a blog entry bemoaning people who only bid in the last couple of hours ;)

-- "Give me your poor tools, your tired steel, your huddled masses of rust." Yep, I ripped off the Statue of Liberty. That's how I roll!

Or seconds? ;^)

-- Eric at http://adventuresinwoodworking.com

Bid what you think the item is worth to you and win it or let it go.
In essence that’s what the final bidder does.
This stink bidding merely protracts the agony of the wait.

Bob

-- A mind, like a home, is furnished by its owner

I am like you Eric, in that I always wait until less than a minute to go before placing a bid but I do not go over what I have determined my preset limit to be. If I get it fine, but like rikkor says another one will appear shortly.

The biggest difficulty I have with Ebay is that buyers often are caught up in auction fever. I recently was watching a dovetail saw that sold for more than the direct purchase price from Lie-Nielsen. Go figure.

Keep bidding. If you are patient you will get what you want at the price you are willing to pay.

-- With God's help all things are possible- even woodworking. Woodworking is not just a hobby, it is an (expletive deleted) expensive hobby.

Yeah, I honestly don’t have a problem with eBay or even with these early and frequent bidders. I do think it’s silly of them to “show their hand” so early, but hey, their loss. I just felt like ranting because I’m tired of watching and watching and waiting for my target price items.

I also try to do enough searches so that I’ll hopefully find that mint condition Stanley #71 router plane that has been grossly mis-listed by the seller as “Saintley Hedge Trimmer (I Really Don’t Know What It’s For But It Has a 71 On It)”.

-- Eric at http://adventuresinwoodworking.com

I’m a fan of sniping auctions at the last minute, especially since a friend told me about Bidnapper, a service that does the sniping for you. You just put in the auction item number, and what your max bid is, then it snipes your bid in during the last 4-5 seconds of the auction. You don’t have to watch, or worry about entering your bid for that auction that’s ending at 2 am. It’s saved me a ton of money, and won me some things that I otherwise wouldn’t have.

-- Robb

In the end, it actually makes me laugh when stuff ends up selling at auction for more than the actual retail. I know what my max is and bid it. If I get it, cool! If I don’t, I will try again another time. If you value your time, and know that it has worth, the time people waste by sitting for hours bidding and watching has a cost. If minimum wage is around 6 dollars and hour and you waste 2 hours trying to save 5 bucks, you suffer from economic amnesia. I also hope that oyu value your time far above minimum wage.

-- making sawdust....

I don’t know of any counts, but I’m guessing that the number of people are growing like the counts on LJ. You used to be able to see some sanity in the bidding process.

But, then again I’m a buyer and not a seller. I’m sure the sellers are happier now.

-- Karson Southern Delaware karson_morrison@bigfoot.com

I really enjoy auctions. When my wife goes with me she often asks, “Are you bidding?” I can now say “yes” without moving my lips.
At a ranch dispersal sale I saw a pallet of 200 T-posts go for $2.75 (each) when you could buy the same size NEW for $1.75.
On ebay I just bid exactly my highest bid. If I get it for less – great.
Unfortunaly the local auction house now requires a $300.00 cash deposit to get a number. They also reserve the right to black-ball you if you do not remove the item in three days.
Another rule I have is that if I get auction fever (yes, you can feel it) I am out of here!

Enjoy life.

-- Bulldog

I also snipe my eBay auctions. I use www.esnipe.com to place my bids 3 seconds before the auction ends.

-- Mike - http://inquisitivewoodworker.blogspot.com/

It’s a little like the auctionier said,” We’ll never let you pay too much.” I think I bought my first item at an auction when I was 12. For years I frequented livestock auctions and bought cattle and horses. I also bought at a lot of farm and ranch sales. The rules are simple; know what it’s worth, know how much you are willing to pay for it, and don’t go over it. You have to know when to get out. There are a lot of games played at auctions and on E-Bay as well. Educate yourself before you leave home. And don’t forget, “We’ll never let you pay too much!!!”

-- Thos. Angle, Owyhee Design, Oregon

Thomas, like you I have a long history at the auction houses.
My personal experience with live auctions is that often the bidding war starts by the auctioneer deliberately starting the bidding at a ridiculously low point.
If it is something I want I counter bid at very near my low estimate and blow off the triflers.
The next step is rapid fire bidding where I immediately take the bid to the next level when I am out bid until I reach my maximum.
The next thing is to quit. There’s alway tomorrow

Bob

-- A mind, like a home, is furnished by its owner

I have used http://www.auctionsniper.com/default.aspx to bid for me for a few years. It will bid for you with only seconds left in the auction.

-- Only the Shadow knows....................

Now someone has to figure out a system that can beat the snipers by a micro-second. ;)

-- Dick Cain, Hibbing, MN. http://www.woodcarvingillustrated.com/gallery/member.php?uid=3627&protype=1

This is one of those discussions that can go on forever, so I might as well add my 2 cents worth (just before the auction ends, of course). I’ve gone both ways on the bidding and I really don’t think it makes much difference in most cases. Oh, I know we all like to think we’re going to be able to steal it if we don’t alert anyone else that we’re lurking in the wings waiting to pounce on an item, but from my experience, any given item goes for what it’s worth, whether I put my top bid in early or sniped at the end.
To me, an auction is the perfect place to find out the value of and item. It’s worth EXACTLY what it sells for at that point in time to the person who bought it.
As a seller, I start all my auctions at $0.99. It does seem to get people interested early on which, as a seller, I want to do, and even though I have a notion as to its value, no matter what I think it’s worth, it’s only worth what a buyer says it’s worth.
Oh, as a buyer I do the same ranting when I can’t get it at my offer price, but there’ll be another. There always is. I’ve been watching for a Stanley #4 1/2 plane for weeks, now. Still haven’t gotten one at what I want to spend. I suppose if I’m to get one, I’ll have to adjust my thinking as to what they’re worth, or hunt forever at garage sales for a bargain.
The only thing I’ll say for sure about ebay is, I wish I had a nickel for every item that flows through that system. If so, price would be no object for the tools I want. -SST

-- You get no points when you punt

When people started giving links here to sniping programs (I use JustSnipe by the way), I was like, “NOOOOOOO! Don’t tell them about sniping!”

But the others have a good point. If you stick to your guns, whether sniping or not, you won’t overspend. We could all snipe the same auction and it wouldn’t give anyone an advantage (unless they were willing to put a huge max bid on it).

-- Eric at http://adventuresinwoodworking.com

Here’s the way I see it: whatever you put on Ebay will be viewed by thousands of people. Some of them are going to know what it’s worth. For buyers, Ebay is a good place to look for that obscure item which is hard to find elsewhere. But screaming deals are really rare, and you’ll most likely be disappointed in the final minutes if you’re planning on picking up that nice tool for 20% of what it’s worth.

It’s actually a better gig for sellers. So better deals may be had from Craigslist or estate/garage sales, where being there at the right moment waving cash swings the deal.

Feel free to vent anyway, though…I feel your pain

-- tallpaul

A brother in-law paid off their house with refurb laptops sold on eBay. I once asked him if I could buy a laptop from him, and he said “no, you can go buy one from someone else cheaper”.

eBay is a fantastic sellers tool, and can be an okay buyer’s tool if you’re willing to make one bid, the value you’re willing to pay for the item, and walk away from it if you don’t get it. However, it’s far too easy to get dragged into the “for only $X more, I could get it…” mentality.

So, in your case, feel happy for the sellers,they’re feeding their families and paying off mortgages based on this, and go find another place to buy where you’ll get a better deal. Or, better yet, figure out how to ride the gravy train yourself.

Complaining about the stupidity of buyers driving up bids on eBay is like complaining about the prices at Neiman Marcus.

-- Dan Lyke, Petaluma California, http://www.flutterby.net/User:DanLyke

The affliction you describe is what I call eBay-itis. It’s characterized by compulsive unfettered bidding leading to inflated prices and happy sellers. I have watched drop-jawed as prices escalate between two or three starry eyed newbies. You can see the symptoms on the bid history page in increments of fifty cents.

One time I sent the high bidders for a particular item the link to a page where the item could be bought new at less price than they were bidding. For my meddling, I received a reply of, “What’s this for?” It seems that some folks just might enjoy the play more than the game. To each his own.

Personally, I’ve been a sniper since starting with eBay. In the early days [ahh, them were the days] if you had a high speed connection, you could swoop in and snatch the goods away from the nickel and dime newbies. Now that everyone has high speed, it’s a little more competitive. If you want a deal off eBay, you’ve got to look for an incorrect description, one crappy photo and an ignorant seller, then you might have a chance.

always,
J.C.

-- "Imagination is more important than knowledge" -- Albert Einstein

Yeah, but , lordy, ain’t it fun???

-- Thos. Angle, Owyhee Design, Oregon

Absolutely!

-- Eric at http://adventuresinwoodworking.com

Yeah, I hate those early bids too. Unless, of course, they’re bidding on something that I’m selling, and hey, the sky’s the limit!

-- Tim -- http://tmuli.com

I think you gave the answer in your post Eric. You mention that some people (me!) can forget about the item in their ‘Watching’ list. That’s exactly why I normally put in my maximum bid as soon as I encounter an item I’m interested in. Then I can forget about it. If I win – great. If I’m beaten, then someone else has obviously valued the item more than I do. Good luck to them. Whether they bid early or late is up to them.

If I come across something interesting in its last hour or so, then I might get out the stopwatch and do some sniping. Great for an adrenalin rush!

-- Res severa verum gaudium - True pleasure is a serious business.