I am HOOKED on Ebay! I’ve had nothing but good experiences with it. But if you are the high bidder don’t get too cocky! I wanted a certain beanie baby and to make sure I got it I waited until the last minute. THEN I put in my bid, and whoever had the previous high bid didn’t have time to try to outbid me! Hehheh!
I’ve always gotten prompt service and I find the neatest things! My son loves the Archie comic books and I found a set of 4 Archie glasses from the 1970s. I got them for him for his birthday and got them for $8. If people want to find unusual gifts I tell them to go to Ebay. I always find out who their favorite celebrities are and I find the coolest stuff for them!
I myself got a musical Ricky Martin keychain for myself. this is the reaction I get when I show it to my friends: :rolleyes:. Go figure!
E-bay doesn’t work like sit-down auction houses. At the sit-down variety, everybody bids till only one person remains. At E-bay, they close an auction at some pre-set time. The last raised bid at that moment in time gets the item. So, your best strategy is to get in at the last second. If you think about it, there’s virtually no reason to enter a bid early in the process, as that can only potentially inflate the final price.
I’ve had several auctions that were open for a week, where I placed a bid with 30 seconds to go and was outbid with 5 seconds to go. At that point, you can’t type fast enough to get in again.
This last-second bidding process is known as ‘sniping’. There are several companies that sell software to automate sniping; I use one called BidSniper. It works fine, although there are others out there that are probably just as good.
Hey Coldie, discover ebay eh. I have done a few transactions on ebay myself…bought a Feynmann lecture on video for my dad…bought a switchblade (always had wanted one of those things)…bought a Steve Vai concert tape in Korea…and bought a signed polaroid and personalized panties from Jenna Jameson herself!
I’ve never used an escrow service but then again…my purchases have all been under a hundred bucks. If you were to buy a BIG ticket item like a $4,000 painting or a 1 year used Lexus LS-400 I would get an escrow service. I’d say use escrow if the item is $400 bucks or over.
Good feedback is important and considered important (it’s like having a good reputation).
Fraud does occur from time to time but mostly on antiques and rare collectibles. Stolen goods are on ebay–but I seriously doubt that you are liable if you unknowningly purchase one.
I’ve bought several things on Ebay. So far I haven’t had any problems with getting my merchandise. Of course that could be because I’m cheap and don’t want to spend too much on things I can’t actually see.
The one thing you really have to be careful of is the addiction. Yes, you heard me right. I said addiction. I can’t tell you how many people I know that started bidding or selling there and now they are hooked.
The best thing to really do is check the feedback. I have noticed a few times that someone with really high feedback has multiple posts from the same person. I don’t know if that’s intentional or not so I try to be very careful about what I bid on. Look it over and see what the response time is for receiving the item.
What Grace said about addiction is SO TRUE! I find myself celebrating that I got outbid at the last second because I didn’t really want what I had bid on, would have had a hell of a time explaining it to my wife, and generally got caught up in the heat of a moment’s desire.
The greatest danger in any auction is paying more than the item is worth, so check out all of the other options for acquiring what you want before getting involved with any online purchase from a stranger. I recently got outbid for a product and found a similar one at Walmart for just a few bucks more than the winning bid. The differences that caused me to buy at the store were manuals, warranty, current model, and the likelihood that it would actually make it to my house.
