Apparently I've been out of the actual bidding game too long on ebay I don't remember snipers being this abundant. Or enraging lol. Twice in two days been outbid in the last 5 seconds. Dumb. My own fault though.
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Apparently I've been out of the actual bidding game too long on ebay I don't remember snipers being this abundant. Or enraging lol. Twice in two days been outbid in the last 5 seconds. Dumb. My own fault though.
I think the only way to deal with that is to have a clear idea of the price you're willing to pay, bid that, then wait to see what happens. If you win it, great. If you get sniped, then it went over what you valued the item at, so let it go.
I know sometimes that's easier said than done. :)
Yep, don't expect to win it before the ending time!
OR, you could join the snipers and set yours for 3 seconds. :banghead:
It is IRRITATING, but legal.
I decided if I can't beat 'em, I'd join 'em. LOL
Only nice thing I can say about the sniping applications is that they'll drop the bid for you in your absence. I won a razor the other day, that finished while I was at work and wouldn't have been able to bid otherwise without throwing a big bid out and hoping for the best. Most of the time, I'll just watch and wait and pull the trigger myself.
The ones the irritate me are the ones that noodle their bids a couple of dollars at time until they find where you stopped and then they go a couple more dollars. LOL
Yep. It's that latter class of bidder that fully convinced me to only ever snipe. Ebay's default bidding system really does make sniping the single best strategy. Unless you really love the adrenalin hit of combat-auctions. Personally, I don't. It eats up way more brain than I'd like, and I'm much happier with automated snipes.
Basically, it saves me from myself. It's super easy for me to go 'hell, I should up my bid a LITTLE MORE.... OH NO, OUTBID! $45 was my max, but I can afford to go to $47!'. With the snipe I'm setting a hard ceiling on my own bidding more than anything else. (Unless it's something I desperately want and see that the bidding is getting close to my maximum).
There are other auction systems that specifically work around snipes -- IE, bidding is extended by 5 minutes after the last bid -- but eBay doesn't usually use those (it may not have the option, I don't know).
I use bidnapper,never fails me as long as I do my part which is to usually overpay:(
They claim .5 secs,works for me.
Thing is, if 2 identically high snipes go in, the first one wins. Waiting for the last second is not always a winning strategy.
I just fired mine on a razor. Somebody was of a like mind. I bid taller than he did and won the razor by a dollar. BOTH bids went in at the same time according to ebay's bid records.
I had mine set to fire at 4 seconds.
I'm happy, I paid less than I thought I would and I won. Makes me feel better about forgetting to bid on an nice old Torrey wedge last night. LOL
I'm pretty sure I beat sniping programs pretty regularly. High speed low latency Internet is good stuff.
The best suggestion for any eBay item is to figure what you think it worth, bid it and sit back. Sometimes you are way out in front of the current bid. Just don't get too attached to the item. Another one will come along if you don't get this one. I think sometimes, bidding like this discourages some bidders out of the race. "Wow, how high is that illegitimi willing to go?", they ask themselves.
I used to agree with that. Times have changed thanks to the multitudes of sniping software available. Now it seems like when I bid early and bid high, my highest I'm willing to go gets discovered and pushed up or topped.
I see razors and pocket knives with 15 bids at 15 bucks or thereabouts all the time. My thinking is that there are a couple of guys that have to feel like they're winning. I've seen 'em go plumb crazy bidding on stuff too as I know everyone else has seen as well.
I guess it boils down to what works best for you and what you're most comfortable with. I do check the "buy it nows" pretty regular. ;)
If I'm bidding, most times I just sit it out and throw a snipe at it.
Excellent point. Need to do a little research first.
It's not about what you get. It's about how much you buy it. Sniping is the easiest way to find it cheaper. I'm sorry but, I'm one of those guys. Coticules 20x5 with1.5cm thick coticule for 30GBP, light colored Celebrated razors for 40$, Charnleys for 40€ and so on. The first years I started buying from ebay I was bidding when I watched an item I liked. But there is no honor! ( :p) So you have to do what the people you are badmouthing are doing. And the watchlist helps you do so. So ebay not only doesn't discourage it, it promotes that kind of behavour, but I'm not sure if I'm against it.
And something else; stop paying so much for stones and razors! Don't be greedy, two of each kind for everyone is enough. Three the most. 200 and 300$ for sheep shears stone is a very high price. And when you buy it for such a price you will sell it for a high price. There is enough for everybody. Especially for razors.
Are you sure that 3 is enough i only have 50 natural razor hones.
and a few manmade ones.
I kind of prefill a really great natural stone for some reason.
I just have 50 to go to get to that awesome number of 100 razor hones.
2 from each. 2 Eschers, 2 Coticules, 2 quality Jnats and so on. I also have 50 something, but they are different ones. I only have more than 2 BBWs. The rest are one of its kind. Oh and two C12Ks If they are man made it doesn't counts though. And I also intend to reach 100, and many more people I'm sure. But not 100 Eschers. Find what suits you, and that's enough. The rest of the world also needs some. If you buy 10s of each, you will influence the price of a rare stone and I'm sure it is already happening. The new people interested in hones need to know about them, and not only from posts. Many of them might not have hundreds of $ to buy one. I waited 6 months to find a reasonable priced Charnley when I was new. We need to be reasonable. And I hope it's not too late.
I use baygenie on my iPad, love it. I actually spend less, as I don't bid the item up 4 days prior, then get stuck in a bidding war and go even higher,
I set my limit and worry about it after.