Screwing your Buddy in the classifieds
 

Hi guys, this is not a effort to smear anyone but rather an attempt to bring to the surface some behavior in the RCU classifieds which is interesting. NOW, everyone loves the classifieds and I'm right there with you all,

however; as is the case with so many GOOD things in life, there seems to be unintended consequences at times. Perhaps I'm alone, perhaps not...but I think the root of the issue I am having with the classifieds comes

down to the reputation.

So here it is: How many times have you searched the listings to find that special item in vain...and then, after many, many hours of fruitless searching you finally see it for sale? Upon reading the

listing you determine that this is exactly what you want...maybe not need...but want. You notice that your the first person to make an offer and because of your desire to obtain this precious item (in your mind, not your

wife's) you offer full asking price. Some time later, perhaps minutes, hours, or days the seller contacts you and states that "it is yours and will send invoice but is at the field currently flying". Your elated....and this is the

GOOD.

Now, the DARK SIDE creeps in...it is another fellow modeler, perhaps your flying buddy, who also sees said precious item and seeing that an offer has already been made knows that being late to the show he

will either have to hope the first offer was below asking price or he will have to offer higher than asking price in order to gain favor with the seller....not knowing what has already transpired between the seller and first

offer. Second bidder now assumes he needs to make a higher than asking price to be competitive...and does so. We all know that as a seller we can sell to whoever, for whatever reason we deem fit (with no offer

OFFICIALLY accepted yet)....but for simplicity lets say the reason here is money. A sort of quasi bidding war insues with the seller now receiving other offers for even more money.

The BAD now....

our seller, not being just anyone's idot, says to self...wooh! I have asked to little for this obviously RARE, HIGHLY SOUGHT AFTER ITEM... I NEED MORE, I DESERVE MORE, for this. In this situation and others like it

nothing is really out of the ordinary. My question though, falls on the seller....as it is the seller that has the choice to make. What would be the right course of action? Having been both buyer and seller in these situations I

know what I would do, but I am interested in seeing where our group is as a whole...Item sold to first agreed to...either at original price or a higher price matching later offer, item relisted, or item sold to whoever came in

with highest offer with no consideration to other offers. I will try to post a poll, as I would like to see what the break down is...please remember, I would like to know what you would do as the seller.

VOTE IN THE POLL

Wow! Interesting Poll so far. That many think that the seller should sell to the first offer at asking price? Really? I've been the victim (multiple times) of Johnny come Lately with a fistful of dollars and a Seller hitting his offer

quicker than a Largemouth on a GoGo Plug....I know some of you don't really feel that way, and diversity of opinion is welcome here. Please vote honestly here as no one's identity is recorded or exposed...this is not a

NSA poll or affiliated with that agency in any way:rolleyes:. If you have a story of a particular item that got away, feel free to share but please refrain from using any user names....just stick to the items that were "promised" but

never came through. Come to think of it, this is kind of like some girlfriends I have had. Here is a picture of my latest heartbreak. A beautiful Zigsaw Atlanta in the original box...I will probably be dead before another shows

up. Good thing I'm more interested in building than collecting...as Don has some of these for sale with fresh foam cores and fresh fiberglass...I guess I'm not too put out, but still hurts to be dissed without a second

thought. Kinda like that potential Prom date that headed the other way when someone flashed a fake Rolex. Geez!

I'm currently in the same situation as the buyer.. put in full price offer + shipping,,, I'm waiting for acceptance,, I go to check I see another offer for $30 more came in 3 hours later (may include shipping) ,,,, I thought auctions we against the rules,,, Huum,,

As per this statement , the seller DID sell you the item , and has no moral right whatsoever to be entertaining ANY further offers on an item that he has already sold !

Any seller who does it any different is a scumbag and should be exposed as such to alert the rest of the buying public to NOT waste any time "bidding" on anything he has for sale . A man of morals upholds the verbal agreements he makes , otherwise his word is worth nothing . After such an untrustworthy move , I wouldn't want the item anyway , since anyone of such low moral character also can't be trusted to tell the truth about things like the item's actual condition , amount of use , and etc .....

This is business, not personal. Business sells to the highest offer, simple as that. If you want to lock in a deal, you ask the seller to officially accept your offer via the classified system and send you an invoice. If he then backs out, you have the recourse of leaving negative feedback for him. But until he accepts your offer, he hasn't officially accepted your offer. I would say the right thing to do is to give the first offer a chance to go up, but most guys will take you to be gouging them and get mad about it.

:rolleyes: Ok , Here's the part you missed ;

If you READ the quote that I quoted of the original post (It's in post #4 of this here thread) , the seller most certainly DID sell the item to the buyer with his statement of "It's Yours" and the follow up "I'll send an invoice when I get home from the flying field" !!!! What part of that do you not understand ? The seller THEN went and sold the SAME ITEM to someone else who came along AFTER the first sale and offered more money . Thing is , that item was ALREADY SOLD and so the seller became a money grubbing scumbag by screwing the first guy for the extra dollars of the second guy . If YOU think this is an OK way to do business , Thank you for the eye opener and I hope you don't plan on selling much here ........

You want a price war auction for every possible penny ? Take it to EBAY , where auctions are the standard operating procedure ........

A seller offers to sell at a set price, a buyer offers asking price, deal is a done deal as far as I am concerned and buyer is obligated to pay, seller is obligated to deliver.

I agree, but that is not how our Classifieds work here at RCU. Maybe a time for improving the system?

Intent is big here...It is a form of collusion whereas the first party to meet the asking price is totally cut out. Are there any ideas out there on how to make it better for all of us? I think it is driving some people away from this site....that hurts all of us because then we have less to look at and choose from here.

So far the results of the poll is what I expected it to be however IMO this is not the truth. It is real simple it is called "supply and demand".

I voted for selling to the first bidder at the asking price.

Under the current format for selling I believe the intent is to not have an auction which is what is being done by some sellers. I too have been first to offer full price with shipping only to loose out to someone who came in later offering more than asking price.

It's just another symptom of the "I don't need to follow the rules" culture evolving today. Just MHO

Pete

Maybe I'm and antique but I believe that if a man doesn't have his word he has nothing. If I told the buyer that the merchandise was his at the offered price I will not accept any other offers. This is no different that a person walking up to me at a flea market and asking how much for something I had for sale. I told him $100. He then said how about $75. Because I really wanted to sell it I said yes. He then put the item down and walked away. I was given an offer of $75 dollars that I accepted and the person just left. Not a man of his word.

you list an item at 5 bucks you get an offer for 5 bucks you sell for 5 bucks. If seller sells to anybody else he should be banned from using classifieds.period. a deal is a deal and both sides must honor it.

The OP is making this an auction site by using the words "bid" and "bidding". I don't believe that was his intent. I believe he meant something like "the first person to accept my offer at my price" . If he actually meant what he said (bid/bidding) he has made this an auction site in which case he obviously sells to the highest bidder over his asking price, the asking price now becoming the minimum acceptable bid. If this is to remain a place to sell items at the OP's asking price, then the first person to accept his offer at his asking price buys the item. The offer at that point is taken off the table. Higher offers are considered a non-occurance and didn't even happen.

I voted, of course, to sell to the first person to accept the OP's offer at his asking price.

If this bothers you don't ever try to sell anything at a swap meet.

Hypothetical situation: A group of guys is sitting around at the flying field solving all the world's problems when Bill drives up, gets out of his truck with a box, approaches the group and says: "I have a brand new Saito .56 four stroke engine in this box that I want to sell. I want $100.00 for it." Jim speaks up immediately and says "I'll take it." Bill says "OK, Jim, you sust bought an engine." But then Chris shouts out "I'll give you $110.00 for it."

Now Bill has a dilemma. His wife gave him strict orders to sell that engine and bring her the money because she wants a new pair of shoes, so he ain't going home with that engine. He is going to sell it to somebody, today, right now, because he knows what his foreseeable future holds if he doesn't. (Also, what it doesn't include) His dilemma is now: who gets it? Jim or Chris? He just made an offer which was accepted and then a higher offer was made. But he could sure use the extra $10.00. So, what to do, what to do?

JollyPopper....I think that interpretation went right of course. If you go back and read the entire thread your questions would be better answered. Actually the word "Bid" is quite synonymous with "Offer" and additionally: extend, present, proffer, propose, tender or volunteer and in no way attempts to implicate the Classifieds as an Auction. To clear up your misconception of what I said concerning the behavior of Buyers and Sellers...here is short summary. Yes, this is a "classified" format not an "auction". I am interested in understanding how we as a online community feel about certain behavior. Feel free to share some of your personal stories but please keep other parties to the transactions anonymous as this is not about individual retaliation but an attempt to see if this behavior is widespread and if there may be a better solution for everyone...sellers included. I agree that if you meet the sellers asking price then that should be satisfactory. The reality is quite different, so what would be a solution to this issue? By the way, this behavior has been around for centuries...so lets try to stay on point and not go off into hypothesis related to Social Ills...not solvable here. Maybe the IT guys that run this thing can tweak it a little and make a big difference...any ideas? This is getting ridiculous when a certain group doesn't follow the rules that everyone else is...sort of an unfair advantage.

The majority in the poll overwhelmingly say the first offer stands, as it should. If the seller doesn't honor the sale, (i.e.; sells to a higher bidder), the seller should be banned for a year from the classifieds. What good are the classifieds if they allow such nonsense to occur without policing and punishment? Sellers like that we can do without.

OTOH, what's with the space after every 2 lines, Discus54? Hard to read. :cool:

Its pretty clear what to do.... You made a verbal agreement with someone standing right in front of you. Someone else, knowing that the deal was already done, tried to get in the way of it. The only Moral thing to do is to sell to the guy you made the first agreement with. If you sell to the second guy, then that first guy gets screwed by TWO jerks.

If you want to play supply and demand - do it in an auction or on eBay - Not in the standard classifieds. Ask the price you want, take your best offer and be a man of your word... Period.

Exactly! Well put Warren.

There's no dilemma here. If you want to entertain offers then don't say, "You just bought an engine" to anyone until you're ready to take that offer and not entertain any others.

When you say, "It's yours" you just sold it. There's nothing to discuss except whether or not a person has personal integrity.

First of all this goes on all the time. In my opinion it is wrong. The seller listed the item for an x amount of money. Once a buyer has placed his offer in essence "Full" price that should be the end of it PERIOD. This is not ebay. If the seller gets another offer for more money over his selling price the decent thing would be to tell the higher bidder that it sold for the original asking price. Especially if he has already accepted the original offer. If this was ebay it would be different, however this is not a bid/auction site. Bottom line is to ensure that you as the seller ask for the amount you really want to begin with and not low ball an ad just to be able to pump up offers. Personally if this happened to me I would flame you here on RCU and call you out for dishonest practices. I would make a copy of the accepted invoice and post it here for all to see.

I hate people who are dishonest.

Glenn

In life amongst other things we have the Givers and theTakers, I have always felt that ones morale character and values aligned you towhich side of the tracks you were on.
I don’t know if I pay more attention to it and or notice itmore today like I didn’t use to when I was younger but, it sure seems to me that there are a lot ofTakers out there, much more than I’ve ever sensed before. Sadly I see this morein the younger generations.
Is this then a reduction in the values and morale character ofthe recent generations, does anyone else think that this has bearing on today’sdecision making and the environment weare questioning?