An MIT study showed sniping is the best way to buy the cheapest on eBay.
To preface, I would like to once again Thank ALL who have ever bid, and/or
won, any of my auctions. I appreciate the time and money you invested in my
livelihood. Even if you stole it (I'm a big boy and knew what could happen
when I listed with a low opening bid and no reserve). I will continue to do my
best to make sure no TR part or car in my area goes to the landfill or crusher
without first being offered for sale to fellow hobbyists.
The problem with sniping is: say a seller offers a BLUE NOS TR6 dash pad for
.95 cents and no reserve. Odds are it will sell higher, but not always. Either
way, that seller is obligated to sell for .95 cents. Is not their risk worthy
of getting more of a serious bid than 10 people with sniping software clogging
the auction in the last ten seconds ALL bidding $9? The one with the "5
seconds from the end software" gets it and the rest are actually cheating
themselves of an opportunity to own a new, one of a kind item, not available
anywhere for a fair price that ended at say, $100.
"They should have entered a $100 bid from the start and got it for $10" is
easy to say in hindsight when the auction is over, but none of the bidders who
would have paid $100 did, we all tried to snipe it for $9. If one had put a
high bid of $100, odds are (according to MIT) someone would bid against them
just long enough to see what their high bid was. I will happily pay a fair
price, but I would rather have it cheaper than fair, that's my reward for my
investment of time hunting the item down and being at the auction when it
ends. But, will the average seller who just got $9 then list one of the other
Dash Pads he has for .95 cents with no reserve? No. The next one will have a
$400 opening bid which is only good for eBay and their ever increasing fees.
$9 is under market, $400 is over, somebody has to lose. What is the fun in
that? If it sold for $80, the seller will try again and hope for the $100 or
more that he thinks is closer to fair market.
When that pad gets Sniped for $9, other sellers will look at that completed
auction and ask: "Why bother selling the Blue NOS Dash Pad I have for only
$9"? and into the landfill it goes. Now all the NOS BLUE Dash Pads are buried
with the garbage because they didn't appear to be worth selling. We can hurt
ourselves trying to be the ultimate sniper. Of course I do it too, I believe
the MIT research and it is how the game is currently played, win or lose.
The solution: English Style auctions. Some auction houses have a 3 minute
delay that gets extended another 3 minutes when someone bids. So if the Dash
pad is at $9 with 2 minutes left, I am going to bid $10. If in 3 minutes, no
one else thinks it is worth a dollar more than I bid and outbids me with an
$11 bid, I win and its market value for that minute, that day is determined.
It is fair to all involved. (though the seller would be disappointed, but that
is the risk one takes)
The way the auction ends, either English Style or eBay Style, should be the
seller's choice, not eBay's. As a buyer, if I prefer to snipe, I can choose to
not participate in the English Style Auctions. if I would rather risk paying
more than I had to, but GET IT and move on, I will go English Style.
In real life as a buyer (I attended almost 300 live auctions this last
year), if I want the sale to end, I double the increase amount the auctioneer
is asking in an effort to discourage further bidding from my opponent. A good
auctioneer will then ask the next bid to match what I have raised it. I can
also ask the auctioneer to cut in half, the increase he is asking for and
maybe that wins it. It really is more fun than eBay, sort of like Poker. There
is some strategy, knowing your opponents, and bluffing.
If a local auctioneer started using a stop watch to determine the end of an
item, the whole crowd would go buy stop watches. The auctioneer would be broke
and out of business in no time.
BTW, Though all of these numbers were arbitrarily plucked out of the air for
illustration purposes, I would have eagerly paid $100 recently for an NOS Blue
Dash Pad for a TR6, but I had to settle for a black as all of the blues are
apparently in the landfill.
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