Feeling a bit nauseated.....

[Jameel Abraham]

Just lost an ebay auction for a 16" Bridgewood Jointer with Shelix head by $50. The winning bid? $2900. Someone got an incredible deal. And I'm feeling a bit nauseated.....:(

[mark page]

I can feel your loss. The best with ebay is to bid your maximum amount you feel comfy with bidding, walk away and don't look back. Your proxy bid will be incremented up to the max amount you want to bid automatically. You win, great, if not, then none of that Pepto Bismol effect, it sold for more than you were willing to pay to begin with. Of course it's not as much fun as constantly pressing the BUTTON. But someone out there with a higher proxy bid will outdo you every time. I recently watched the PM66 on Amazon go for $16xx.xx and was there for not quite 24 hrs that I knew of. I need another saw like a second (use any imagination), but was kind of sick when it wasn't there anymore. I felt little sick and really didn't even need the thing. Was a good price.

[Andrew Williams]

nowadays people use auction sniper software to win ebay bids. Frankly I'm agin it, but it's the way it is.

[Noah Katz]

"Just lost an ebay auction for a 16" Bridgewood Jointer with Shelix head by $50. The winning bid? $2900.Someone got an incredible deal. And I'm feeling a bit nauseated.....:("

There's no way to know whether you should or not.

You're assuming that another $50, or whatever, and you would have won, but for all you know, the winner might have set his max bid at $1K more than the winning bid.

[Richard Blaine]

You're assuming that another $50, or whatever, and you would have won, but for all you know, the winner might have set his max bid at $1K more than the winning bid.

That's right. I've been known to get an item or two for 75% of my final bid. Having said that, I do know the feeling, 'cause you never know if another penny would have made the difference.

[Brent Dowell]

Yup. Ebay. Great concept, put in your max bid, etc...

Problem is that if you really want something, seems like you either need to use a sniping service, or someone else will.

I remember the first several times I lost auctions due to someone coming in at the last minute. Didn't seem fair, and was downright annoying.

[David G Baker]

I rarely ever bid until the auction is almost over, this way I am not driving the bidding price up. I have used the snip software in the past but didn't really like it, takes the fun out of the process. I also put the maximum I will pay for an item near the auction end time and walk away, this way I don't get caught up in the bidding frenzy that lets my ego get in the way of common sense.

[Jameel Abraham]

I hear you guys. I've bid on maybe 5 items since ebay started, and I've won like one auction. Great place to sell though.

The thing with this jointer was, there was the same model that Wilke sold the week before and it went for 3200, only without the Shelix. So I figured I'd have some fun and put in a bid for $2800, figuring it would go for at least 1k more than that. I was sweating when it got down to the last 6 seconds when someone outbid me. I don't have the money for it, so I was kind of releived to lose. But man, what a bargain!

[Don Bullock]

I rarely ever bid until the auction is almost over, this way I am not driving the bidding price up. I have used the snip software in the past but didn't really like it, takes the fun out of the process. I also put the maximum I will pay for an item near the auction end time and walk away, this way I don't get caught up in the bidding frenzy that lets my ego get in the way of common sense.

That's pretty much what I do. I use a clock with a second hand and jump in within the last five seconds of the bidding with my bid. Using that method I have won many auctions on eBay over the years. I've also lost a lot that I'd like to have won, but many of those just went for more than I was willing to pay. As David said, this way of bidding keeps me from running up the bid prics or getting caught up in a last minute bidding war.

[Chuck Harris]

Don't feel too bad. I've often seen things on Ebay go for more than they are worth as well. As always you need to be an informed consumer. I don't know how many times I've seen seen the final bid look like a deal until the cost of shipping was added in , or the final bid be a few dollars less than the retail value. when I do bid on something I figure out the most I'm willing to pay as a final total cost and make my maximum bid based on that. If the bid jumps up higher because someone had a higher max bid, oh well...

[Jeff Raymond]

I'm no fan of the bay, after doing some buying and selling a number of years ago. Don't feel bad. I sold a big-ticket item and it took me 18 months to get them to stop overcharging me on the fee. They literally have no customer 'service' and don't care. It's a big money-making machine and the pros run it. Lately we had a friend buy something on it and our money is gone, gone, gone; item never shipped.

Find a reputable source for what you are buying which actually has a reputation and a name to defend, with customer service, pay a little extra and get what you are paying for.

BTW: There are people who think the internet is real. :D

["Gary Brewer"]

Hey Jameel: What about the drum sander? See you lost your focus on that jointer! You mentioned a wide belt sander also. There are more tools in the sea. ( It was a great deal though!)
Gary

[Noah Katz]

"Problem is that if you really want something, seems like you either need to use a sniping service, or someone else will."

I don't get the reasoning; isn't that only true if their max bid is the same as yours?

[Brent Dowell]

Well,

I just revisited this thread because of a very recent (right now) experience I had on Ebay.

In addition to woodworking, I'm trying to restore a 1946 chevy fleetmaster that my wifes father bought brand new in 1946.

There is a part out there that I've been trying to find for a very long time (Let's put it this way, I've been working on this project for 10 years+ :eek: ).

So, the other day, I saw one come up on Ebay. I emailed the seller, asking if there was a buy it now option (I'm generally pretty frustrated with ebay, so I usually mostly do buyitnows). He says he'd rather let the auction run. That's fine by me, I just thought I would ask.

So I've been watching it for the last week. 1 guy bid on the item early on and the price was at 39.99 for the entire week. At about 5 minutes left to go, all of a sudden the action starts to increase. A couple of guys get in a bidding war and bid it up to around 50$.

Fine. A couple of days ago, I went to the sniping service I subscribe to and said that if it came right down to it, I'd be willing to pay up to 75 bucks for this part, because just a few weeks ago, I saw someone pay 90$ for the same part! I signed up for the service at one point when I was bidding on pen blanks and got incredibly frustrated with being outbid on about 10 auctions within the last minute. I've used it maybe 3 times total.

Short story long, I got the part for 51.50.

What would have happened if I had posted my bid 3 days ago? 1 hour ago? Most likely a nasty bidding war between me and the other guys.

I think that sometimes the heat of the moment can get to folks and they can get into these bidding wars. Good for the sellers, I guess. not so good for the buyers...

All in all, No matter how you do it, the Sellers get their money and the buyers pay. All I did was to conceal my highest bid until the last 5 seconds of the auction. If someone else was using a service and had a higher final bid, they would have won. The only difference is that instead of a week long bidding war going on, there was a 5 second one, with no chance for second thoughts....