flyinrog

My Feedback: (1)

I am bidding on an item on the bay it started at $9.99, I put in a max of $21.00.....so I am winning at $9.99,, 2 days later the second bid is $20.49, it cant be that coincidental, either someone can see my max and is trying to "scare" me to up my bid, well thats its someone/somehow can see my max bid...and thats not fair,,I guess I will wait to the last minute and see if I win, I will go higher but not a lot....hate to ***** and not share, but its a little rare and I dont want to let it go...Rog

vpresley

My Feedback: (162)

Hi

As an avid Ebayer, I can tell you that someone just bid higher. It only beats your bid by a set amount. thats why it seems they know your bid when they really dont.

Vince

fritzke

My Feedback: (1)

Rog,
E-bay just added 50 cents to their bid of $19.99, so you are at 20.49 and you are still winning
the auction, but I'll bet not for long. (The automated bid increments get bigger as the price goes up, see link.)
If someone comes along and bids $50, the next required bid will go up to $21.50 (.50 cents over your $21 bid)
and they will be the high bidder unless someone bids more than $50. But you will not KNOW their
exact proxy bid amount until it is exceeded. I have bid on things on e-bay only to find that all I am doing is increasing
the price the winner has to pay for the item. I have bid 2-10x the current price just to find out they want it
even more than I do.
Dave

http://pages.ebay.com/help/buy/bid-increments.html

flyinrog

My Feedback: (1)

We've been down this road, it didnt out bid me it just went up to 50 cents less than my max, and it wasnt 19.99 it was 9.99 and went to 20.49 , under my max of 21.00.....Rog,, oh and no one is gonna go $50 on this, well not me anyway....

Mr Cox

It sounds like someone bid $20 (they have no way of knowing your bid) and there is then an auto-generated bid from you of $20.49, so nothing strange at all...

You can also look at the bid history, including auto-generated bids to see what has happened.

Worst thing is when you think your "winning" at a decent prize and someone puts in a bid at the very last second, don't they have a life...?

flyinrog

My Feedback: (1)

Well that makes more sense, I guess, they went to $20 just to see and I still outbid them....but there was only 1 other bid...Rog

controlliner

I have seen evidence of "bid boosters" before on *bay. A guy asks a "buddy" to chase a bidder higher to try and get more money. We used to be able to find out where the bidders were from at one time and a lot of bidders were in the same State, County etc. I am sure the situation still exists. *bay doesent care either way, the higher something goes for, the more money the company gets.

fizzwater2

My Feedback: (61)

I don't usually bid on things until they're almost ending. It's too tempting to folks to pay just 50c more, just to be the one that wins.

Figure out what your max is, bid near the end and if you get it great, if not, there will probably be another one...

ChopperMike

That's what I do. I don't even bid until it's almost over. That way if the high bidder isn't watching it at the time and their max is less than mine I win it.


Mike

controlliner

The big problem is the guys with the "Bidnapper" programs that are used to "Snipe" at the last second

MJD

My Feedback: (1)

Bingo. IF you really want something then you need to be there at close unless there is nobody else in the world interested. It may be irritiating, but for everyone that wants something, there is someone in the world willing to make a bit more effort to get it. It's just the way it is.

Rog - what you saw is standard proxy bidding upon which eBAy is based. That's how it works. If you put in $25 as a maximum and someone else had put a maximum of $18, and your first bid was $10, then your bid would automatically be bumped to $18.00 + the bid increment. It is a good system, that way your automatic bid is only ever one step higher than the lower guy's.

Manual sniping is SOP, and I decide what my real, not panicked OMG-I-need-it, maximum is that I can walk away from, then that goes in last minute. And I mean, last minute. Otherwise there is just no point.

Bidding ahead of time does nothing more than wake up the vendor that he should get his buddies to shill bid the price higher.

I lose stuff like that all the time, and in my case that is just eBay's way of saying I don't really need it anyhow. It's a dog-eat-dog world.

MJD

controlliner

MJD very well written

controlliner

What is real funny is watching something go for way more than it can be ever practically worth. I think some people get wrapped up in the desire to win so much that they forget about reasonable value I often save auctions to watch the end result.[:@]

fritzke

My Feedback: (1)

MJD,
That's how I bid; the most I am willing to pay (INCLUDING the often crazy shipping prices)
and bid at the last moment possible. Gets the adrenaline going. When you see something
sell for a crazy ***** price at the last second it's because TWO bidders threw in huge
"gotta get it" bids and higher bidder gets tagged big time. It's always informative to look at
the bid history when the auction is over and see how it all went down. Sometimes you see
that some bidder made many many bids at the end trying to eek in a winning amount.
But you will still not know how much the ultimate winner had "in reserve" even then.
Dave

colingw

My eBay policy is quite simple: decide before the auction what the maximum price I would pay for the item is, set that amount, and don't even look again until its all over.

Sometimes I win, sometimes I lose, sometimes I get a bargain (like the new-in-box MK-17 diesel for which I was the only bidder and got at the start price).

I've long since adopted the viewpoint that eBay items are like trains at my local station ... if you miss one, there'll be another one along soon.

cheers,
Colin

jeffie8696

Place your bid at what you feel comfortable paying and ignore it. If you win great if you lose then it went for too much anyways. It is too easy to get caught up in bidding fever and paying way too much for something. Let the other guy throw away his money.
You will not pay your max bid if nobody else bids up to it.

MJD

My Feedback: (1)

That indeed is the attitude that will let you sleep at night. Hard to do, but whatever it is that you want, there's more than one out there. I've been hoarding rocket collectibles and sitting on them over the current (US anyway) economic slump. I put one up two weeks ago amd got an "okay" price but not what it should have fetched. Despite the helpful advice of eBay not to set your reserve too high, the fact is if nobody buys it then big friggin deal, try again. Unless you are fending off the Repo Man, then better get what you can. But I didn't do that this time and remembered why I should have..

MJD

DeviousDave

I never bid until right before the auction ends. Occasionally, someone with a sniper program will get me but more often than not I win that way. Why give the other guy a few days to work on you, and why bid it up early? Never could understand why people do that.

poheller

My Feedback: (34)

Dont bid a even dollar, like 20.00 bid 20.01 or 20.51, because i have won stuff before because i was at 20.01 and some guy bid 20.00 and quite because he thought i was higher in dollar amount not penneys.

jessiej

It all comes down to who gets there lastest with the mostest.

jess

hairy46

My Feedback: (1)

First thing I do is look at the shipping if it is jacked up I just move on! But if the shipping seems reasonable then I bid up to where I will pay and hope I get it and if I do not I look for another auction about the same thing. I have found something by chance that I was looking for and jump in in the last few minutes. if I was to wait for the end I would most likely forget about it. best for me to jump in with both feet right away! But sometimes I had waited for the last minute debaiting if I wanted it before I bid or to wait and see just about how high it will go.

Wiggy

I sometimes use esnipe to place my bids. It is similar to bidding on eBay but it only places the bid in the last seconds before the auction ends. Electronic countermeasures for those who do not want to watch at the end.

Do it as you would on eBay by deciding what you are willing to pay and entering that amount. The biggest difference is an additional 1% you pay for the service. You do not run up the bidding or reveal your bid in advance so you could save a few bucks.

http://www.esnipe.com/

Billy

AllTheGoodNamesAreTaken

My Feedback: (180)

There are other programs that do the same thing for free or you pay a small fee to buy the program. 1% per transaction is crazy. [:'(] I use a program I paid $15 for 3 years ago. I get free updates for life. The program works flawlessly.
Anytime I see something I'm interested in buying, I copy the auction number and paste it in the program. I enter how much I'd be willing to pay for it and if the bidding exceeds that amount, oh well. If it hasn't, then it will place a bid on my behalf within the last few seconds. I don't even have to be near the computer. It takes the emotion out of it and has since saved me from making impuse purchases - just to be the high bidder. It's also scored me some serious bargins.

Firepower R/C

My Feedback: (10)

AllTheGoodNamesAreTaken,

What is the name of your $15 program if I may ask?

Thanks!

AllTheGoodNamesAreTaken

My Feedback: (180)

AuctionSentry.com

I just looked at the pricing and it seems that they have a new cost structure... ~ $10 year. It's still a great program and you can try it for free.