# Can anyone give me a few pointers on using ebay? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 5, 2011, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-give-me-a-few-pointers-on-using-ebay/591641 "2011-08-05T21:39:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![eclectic\_wench](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ac91a4/32.png) [@eclectic\_wench](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eclectic_wench)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2011, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-give-me-a-few-pointers-on-using-ebay/591641/21 "2011-08-07T23:21:11Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#): > > But what happens when two or more people place their top bids at the same price point? Does the auction immediately jump up to that level? Yes, it immediately jumps to that level. In case of an exact tie, earlier bid wins. It’s practically impossible to have identical bids with identical timing - ebay’s servers can compare down to nanoseconds, or something. But just in case, never bid round numbers. Don’t bid $60; bid $60.07 or something, in case someone else also thinks it’s worth sixty bucks. ---
**Author:** ![Lukeinva](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lukeinva/32/17872_2.png) [@Lukeinva](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lukeinva)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2011, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-give-me-a-few-pointers-on-using-ebay/591641/22 "2011-08-07T23:31:19Z")
> [@sqweels](#): > > I’d like to hijack the thread and get some advice on _selling_ stuff on e-bay. > > I have 100s of back issues or Rolling Stone magazine (I’ve completed the process of photographing all the covers) and some other magazines (Maxim, National Lampoon). I also have a yard-high stack of coffee table-style books and 100s of LP records (classic rock and classical) and some 78s. > > Should I even bother to try and sell this kind of stuff on e-bay? How best does one maximize profitability in this area? Heck yes! Collectibles are exactly what eBay is best for, and they are cheap enough that people will buy them, and easy to ship for the seller. However, I don’t know what the market is for magazines and LPs but I hope it’s stout enough for you to make some cash. One tip I would offer is, sell during the winter months. There are fewer collectors on their computers during the summer season. ---
**Author:** ![Francis\_Vaughan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/francis_vaughan/32/3093_2.png) [@Francis\_Vaughan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Francis_Vaughan)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2011, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-give-me-a-few-pointers-on-using-ebay/591641/23 "2011-08-08T01:52:02Z")
> [@eclectic\_wench](#): > > … a whole bunch of useful clarification… Yeah, my terminology was not the best. I agree 100% with the points made. Pretty much the correction is that where I wrote “bid” I should have said “successful bid” i.e. a bid that actually became the current highest bid. If there is an existing bid that had a maximum higher than your new bid, you won’t be successful. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2011, 5:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-give-me-a-few-pointers-on-using-ebay/591641/24 "2011-08-08T05:11:00Z")
> [@eclectic\_wench](#): > > No. With ebay, the price paid is one increment above the second _highest_ bid. That second highest bid could have been placed in the first five minutes of the auction; it could have been the first of a dozen bids, by a dozen different bidders. > > Sniping is just late proxy bidding: bidding the maximum you’re willing to pay, but doing it at the last second. It won’t make any difference at all against another proxy bidder, whether early or late. If you bid $50 with one second to go, but someone else had bid $60 on the first day, you lose. > > Again, no. You can absolutely be outbid, by a much earlier bid. > > But you can’t be _reactively_ outbid. In other words, if the only other bidders are nibblers who are incapable of deciding what they’re willing to pay without seeing someone else’s bids in front of them, then yeah, you’re in luck. The problem is that there’s no way to know in advance whether you’re bidding against a proxier or a nibbler, or whether there’s another sniper waiting in the wings to bid at the same second as you. Hence the importance of bidding your max (ebay won’t use the whole lot unless it’s necessary). > > Sort of. Except that, just because the bid amount _showing_ five seconds before the close is $5, that doesn’t mean that actual highest bid is $5. It could well be that that bidder has a proxy of $50, but ebay isn’t using it because it hasn’t been needed. So even if the bid price showing is $5, your bid of $51 could still leave you paying $51. > > Now this part I agree with 100% 😉 Right, Sniping doesn’t help you win at all, it helps you stay out of a bidding war. Which is exactly what proxy bidding does. Place one bid, then that’s it. A proxy bid will win over a snipe \*every single time, \*assuming they are both bidding about the same. In fact, a snipe will lose to a proxy unless the snipe is higher than the proxy by more that 50 cents or $1 (the bid increments go up as the price goes up, at a certain point, you must not only outbid, but outbid by more than $1 ymmv). In other words, if I proxy bid $50.00 on the very 1st day the auction is open, and you come in with a last second snipe at $50.01, I win, you lose, no matter how lat second your snipe comes in. Now it’s true- sometimes there’s a bidding war, in which case your proxy will be outbid. So? You have already bid the max you wanted to pay, you haven’t\* lost\* anything. Same thing with a snipe- if somebody bids more than you’re willing to pay- you lose. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2011, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-give-me-a-few-pointers-on-using-ebay/591641/25 "2011-08-08T05:12:56Z")
> [@sqweels](#): > > I’d like to hijack the thread and get some advice on _selling_ stuff on e-bay. > > I have 100s of back issues or Rolling Stone magazine (I’ve completed the process of photographing all the covers) and some other magazines (Maxim, National Lampoon). I also have a yard-high stack of coffee table-style books and 100s of LP records (classic rock and classical) and some 78s. > > Should I even bother to try and sell this kind of stuff on e-bay? How best does one maximize profitability in this area? I suggest you sell the 'zines by the lot, one year per lot. ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2011, 5:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-give-me-a-few-pointers-on-using-ebay/591641/26 "2011-08-08T05:17:06Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > I suggest you sell the 'zines by the lot, one year per lot. I bought 3 copies of the National Enquirer headlining Rush Limbaugh’s drug bust. Sold them for $30 each a year later. Should have gotten more copies. ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2011, 9:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-give-me-a-few-pointers-on-using-ebay/591641/27 "2011-08-08T09:31:24Z")
> [@sqweels](#): > > I’d like to hijack the thread and get some advice on _selling_ stuff on e-bay. > > I have 100s of back issues or Rolling Stone magazine (I’ve completed the process of photographing all the covers) and some other magazines (Maxim, National Lampoon). I also have a yard-high stack of coffee table-style books and 100s of LP records (classic rock and classical) and some 78s. > > Should I even bother to try and sell this kind of stuff on e-bay? How best does one maximize profitability in this area? If you don’t want to deal with them yourself, you could try a service like iSoldIt, who sells stuff for you for a 30% commission. Or get a college kid to do it for $8/hour plus 10% 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Francis\_Vaughan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/francis_vaughan/32/3093_2.png) [@Francis\_Vaughan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Francis_Vaughan)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2011, 9:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-give-me-a-few-pointers-on-using-ebay/591641/28 "2011-08-08T09:38:13Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Right, Sniping doesn’t help you win at all, it helps you stay out of a bidding war. This is true. The argument in favour of sniping is that a very large number of people don’t use a proper proxy bid, but are somehow still locked into the idea that it is a competitive auction. If this illusion was dropped, realistic proxy bidding and sniping become almost identical in effect, except, as you point out, sniping is inferior in the case that two bidders have very close to the same maximum. If everyone simply placed a single proxy bid, proxy bidding would work perfectly. However, in the current slightly surreal world of eBay, many people still make little incremental bids. If you are bidding you can’t always tell. Reviewing the bid history can let you get some idea, of who is bidding and how. But even then you don’t fully know, nor know who may join later. In this case sniping is a tactical play. You are betting that enough bidders are idiots, and that a sniper bid will, on average, be a better play than a single proxy bid. If you are not bidding against idiots, and there is at least one serious bidder, with a solid proxy bid, you may lose out. But only if you both decide that the item is worth essentially the same amount. Even then, if you had made a proxy bid, there is a 50/50 chance you made your bid second, and would lose anyway. Even proxy bidders get bound up in the emotion. eBay plays on this, with notifications that your bid is now losing. Sniping helps insulate you from the emotional plays. Although that said, some sniping sites will watch the auction for you, and will email you if your sniper bid has dropped below the current bid. Turning off notifications is a good idea. Cold hearted play wins in the long run, whether it be proxy bidding or sniping. ---
**Author:** ![eclectic\_wench](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ac91a4/32.png) [@eclectic\_wench](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eclectic_wench)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2011, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-give-me-a-few-pointers-on-using-ebay/591641/30 "2011-08-08T22:53:36Z")
Francis Vaughan, I kind of figured we were saying the same thing from different angles 🙂 > [@DrDeth](#): > > In fact, a snipe will lose to a proxy unless the snipe is higher than the proxy by more that 50 cents or $1 (the bid increments go up as the price goes up, at a certain point, you must not only outbid, but outbid by more than $1 ymmv). In other words, if I proxy bid $50.00 on the very 1st day the auction is open, and you come in with a last second snipe at $50.01, I win, you lose, no matter how lat second your snipe comes in. No - again, there’s that difference of high bid showing versus high proxy bid. You only need to bid one increment higher than the high bid _showing_ in order for your max to go up against the other bidder’s max. Your bid doesn’t meed to be an increment higher than the other bidder’s max. Example: the auction starts at $15. I bid $50 on the first day. Now I’m the high bidder at $15. You have to bid at least $15.50. That, or any higher amount, is accepted by the system and goes up against my $50. If you bid $50.01 at the last second (or any other second), you’ll win for $50.01. I’ve seen it happen a lot of times. In certain circles, the one-second one-cent snipe used to be the ultimate badge of sniper honour. In case of an exact tie, though, yeah, the early proxier beats the sniper. ETA: Kaylasdad, I’m pretty sure this is more sniping theory than you ever wanted to know, but hey, it might come in useful sometime… ---
**Author:** ![thirdname](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d07c76/32.png) [@thirdname](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thirdname)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2011, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-give-me-a-few-pointers-on-using-ebay/591641/31 "2011-08-08T23:52:33Z")
I would recommend using Craigslist (online classified ads) instead. The prices are often cheaper, you don’t have to pay shipping, and you can examine the item before buying. Here’s a search for Ipod Touches between $20 and $80: [http://orangecounty.craigslist.org/search/sss?sort=date&maxAsk=80&minAsk=20&query=ipod%20touch&srchType=T](http://orangecounty.craigslist.org/search/sss?sort=date&maxAsk=80&minAsk=20&query=ipod%20touch&srchType=T) and Nano: [orange co for sale "ipod nano" - craigslist](http://orangecounty.craigslist.org/search/sss?query=ipod+nano&srchType=T&minAsk=20&maxAsk=80&sort=date) ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2011, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-give-me-a-few-pointers-on-using-ebay/591641/32 "2011-08-09T01:25:25Z")
> [@eclectic\_wench](#): > > No - again, there’s that difference of high bid showing versus high proxy bid. You only need to bid one increment higher than the high bid _showing_ in order for your max to go up against the other bidder’s max. Your bid doesn’t meed to be an increment higher than the other bidder’s max. > > Example: the auction starts at $15. I bid $50 on the first day. Now I’m the high bidder at $15. > > You have to bid at least $15.50. That, or any higher amount, is accepted by the system and goes up against my $50. If you bid $50.01 at the last second (or any other second), you’ll win for $50.01. > > I’ve seen it happen a lot of times. In certain circles, the one-second one-cent snipe used to be the ultimate badge of sniper honour. > > In case of an exact tie, though, yeah, the early proxier beats the sniper. > > .. What you seem to be saying is exactly what I said- that if I place a Proxy bid for $50.00, and then you snipe the auction at the very last second for $50.01, then I win, and you lose. Yes, you may only see my proxy bid at $15, but what you see my bid at is not germane. My bid is $50.00. You must beat my bid by at least the bid increment (which is $1 at the $50 level) amount. If you do not bid more than $50.99, you lose, no matter when you placed the bid. A “last second” bid gets you nothing but bragging rights, if that. But then your statement _“That, or any higher amount, is accepted by the system and goes up against my $50. If you bid $50.01 at the last second (or any other second), you’ll win for $50.01.”_ is false, as you must beat my $50 bid by at least $1. Your last second bid of $50.01 will lose. My proxy bid, placed a week ago at $50 will win. Timing means nothing on eBay. Only dollars. > **[Security Measure | eBay](https://www.ebay.com/splashui/captcha?ap=1&appName=orch&ru=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ebay.com%2Fhelp%2Fbuying%2Fbidding%2Fautomatic-bidding%3Fid%3D4014&iid=30b2bb46-f279-4086-8102-9212c67592bf&iim=GMTg0Ljp&iia=mnEwNS45dO&iiz=cuOOS4xMDA*fZv)** ---
**Author:** ![Kevbo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e47774/32.png) [@Kevbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kevbo)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2011, 4:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-give-me-a-few-pointers-on-using-ebay/591641/33 "2011-08-09T04:37:18Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > …if I proxy bid $50.00 on the very 1st day the auction is open, and you come in with a last second snipe at $50.01, I win, you lose, no matter how lat second your snipe comes in. This is incorrect. If the current high bid (not proxy limit) were below $49.01 at the time the sniper entered the 50.01, then the bid would be accepted and win. The bidding increment determines what bids will be accepted, but once a bid is accepted, it doesn't have to be but .01 above the next lower bid to win. This is how stuff ends up with oddball prices. This is a reason not to snipe too late. By getting in a little earlier (but still too late for an emotional bidder to react to) you reduce the odds that another bidder will push the current bid to within an increment of your price and cause your slightly higher bid to be rejected, and increase the odds that slightly higher (less than an increment) late snipe will be rejected. ---
**Author:** ![Kevbo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e47774/32.png) [@Kevbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kevbo)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2011, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-give-me-a-few-pointers-on-using-ebay/591641/34 "2011-08-09T04:50:54Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Timing means nothing on eBay. Only dollars. > > [Automatic bidding | eBay](http://pages.ebay.com/help/buy/bid-increments.html) Per your cite: > [@](#): > > Can my bid be increased by more than the standard increment? > > A bid can be increased by more than the standard increment if more than a standard increment is required to:\ > > Beat a competing bidder’s high bid. We’ll increase your bid to more than the incremental amount to beat another bid up to the amount of your maximum bid. > [@](#): > > Can I be outbid by less than a full increment? > > You can be outbid by less than a full increment. A winning bidder’s maximum bid needs only to exceed the next highest maximum bid by one cent. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2011, 5:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-give-me-a-few-pointers-on-using-ebay/591641/35 "2011-08-09T05:00:47Z")
Ha!:smack: [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-anyone-give-me-a-few-pointers-on-using-ebay/591641.md?page=1)