[455HOGT37]

I have my 63 Cat project on eBay right now with no reserve and no BIN. It's a straight auction with no games. The opening bid is not rock bottom, but is still lower than I expect it will sell for. In the last week I have had two bidders meet my opening bid, let it ride for a few hours, then retract the bid.

So my guestion for all the eBay veterans out there: What's their motivation for doing this? I can see someone hunting for a reserve price, but I have no reserve. Also, I can see if these were my own buddies bidding on my behalf trying to run the price up, but they are not.

What gives?

[Kurt Zimmerman]

People are stupid. Bottom line.

Anything can happen, but my experience is on any auto auction, all the action is in the last half-hour. Serious buyers wait until then for any type of bid.

Your best hope in an auto auction is to get your auction exposed to as many people as possible. They won't bid if they don't know about it.

Include as many APPLICABLE key and search words in your description as possible. Use every letter of your title, some people only search the titles.

Is this it?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Ponti...item4cfe0af2f3

Good Luck!

Kurt

[beemergary]

Better they pull the bid than be a NO SHOW Good Luck

[Kurt Zimmerman]

I just looked it over, it seems to be a very well written ad, (and a good deal, by the way!)

The only disadvantage I can see is it ending on Super Bowl Sunday, the day when most guys are already pushing the limits of their wife's patience!

Good luck with your sale. Sunday afternoons are usually good times to end auctions- lots of people on the computer.

I think the two early bids and withdraws just show that two people out there recognized it as a good deal, (which it is) and figured they might get lucky on a minimum bid, but had second thoughts, more than likely related to their own personal budget restrictions.

Kurt

[Cliff R]

When I sell something on Ebay, my starting price is the ABSOLUTE LOWEST NUMBER that I can live with. I run my auction, don't worry about what happens for a second, and sleep fine at night. If one bid comes in, I consider the auction successfull.

NEVER put a Reserve on anything. There are just too many buyers who don't want to guess at what you want for it, and don't have the time to piss around bidding it up to find out.

SERIOUS buyers, from what I've seen, "swoop" in at the very end of the auction to win the prize.

IF I see folks bidding up an auction really early in the deal, to and beyond where the item should sell for, they are either working for the seller to "boost" the auction, or Darwinism hasn't removed them from the general population quite yet......Cliff

[455HOGT37]

Originally Posted by Kurt Zimmerman

People are stupid. Bottom line...


...Is this it?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Ponti...item4cfe0af2f3

Yep, that's it.

The first guy had a few dozen transactions under his belt, but nothing since 2006 - a potential red flag. But the second guy is experienced with recent transaction history... Doesn't seem to fit the bill as a naive bidder.

My strategy was to go in as low as I could live with to generate interest, which seems to have worked based upon the views/watchers count. I expect it to sell for more, but I won't put a gun in my mouth if I only pull one legitimate bid. My main mistake was ending it on Super Sunday... I don't follow football, so I didn't realize that was coming up. May help, may hurt...

I was thinking that there must be some kind of underlying strategy to the bid retractions, but I suppose it's possible that two people got cold feet.

[Teej]

Well written, reasonable price, good pictures... Doesn't look like any surprises there. Looks like it would be a great car to pick up and play with. As for your bid retractions, I have no idea. Like people have said, the action will take place at the last minute for serious bidders. I don't see a strategy for bidding and then retracting.

[455HOGT37]

I realize the real action is in the last few seconds so I'm not worried at all. Sell; no sell... I don't care. I have plenty of shop space.

However, I'm interested in the game strategy in these auctions, and I'm not familiar with the behavior of these two bidders. As a buyer, there is certainly a benefit of going in high and early if you want to scare off some of your competition, but being the first bidder on an item with 2 days left shows you at least have time to think about what you're doing... The retraction doesn't make sense. Anyway, perhaps it's just as simple as cold feet.

I guess we'll see tomorrow!

[Frogday]

I don't think going in high and early in an ebay auction is the norm. People want to get as much of a steal as they can. I would expect people to add it to their watch list and check back closer to the end of the auction to see if it is still lower than what they want to pay.

The last 10 seconds of the auction is where people will enter what their real max bid is...no point in driving up the price early.

It would be nice if ebay would add another minute to the auction if a bid is placed with less than a minute to go. That would eliminate the sniping and people would actually be getting a fair auction price on the sale.

[Cliff R]

"I don't think going in high and early in an ebay auction is the norm."

+1

This is a very good indicator that the seller has taken steps to make sure they get top dollar for their item.

It's pretty obvious when an auction is being "boosted" by someone with an association to the seller.

Next time a relatively valuable item goes up for next to nothing for a starting price, watch the bidding closely. When a really interested buyer starts hitting the auction with low bid, there is almost ALWAYS someone to push them higher.

This is a very common practice, especially for "Power Sellers", they are NOT going to loose money on anything they sell, count on it.....Cliff

[455HOGT37]

The high and early is not the norm I'm sure, but it is a tool. Not everyone is looking for a steal - sometimes you just have to have it.

I also will offer items for bid far below their "market value". I have an aircraft part on auction right now that has broad appeal and will bring 5-600 bucks all day long. My opening price was $50 bucks which seems to have generated significant interest. It hit the $500 dollar mark yesterday and the auction closes tomorrow.

[lust4speed]

Originally Posted by Frogday

...It would be nice if ebay would add another minute to the auction if a bid is placed with less than a minute to go. That would eliminate the sniping and people would actually be getting a fair auction price on the sale.

Don't agree. Most auctions have stalled out before the ending time. A successful snipe has to be entered high enough to outbid every one else. That's why things can get crazy at the last minute. There are dozens of bids that don't show up because they were sniped at a lower price than the actual bid of the last person, or sniped after a higher snipe. The process might be automated, but it still works the same way. Even with sniping, I loose many auctions simply because someone wanted it and was willing to pay more than I chose to bid.

A serious buyer that really wants the item is going to put in a bid that will insure his winning. It doesn't matter whether the bid was entered a day before or in the last few seconds. In other words, the last person to bid might be in first position with a bid of $3,400 but his actual bid entered could be $10,000. When the smoke settles he will get the win on the next increment over the highest snipe bid.

[Jerry H.]

I've been buying and selling both cars and parts on ebay for several years, and I agree with most of what has been posted. One thing that has been posted that I have NOT experienced. When selling parts, it is true that the majority of bidding comes in the last few minutes. However, when selling vehicles I've found exactly the opposite to be true! I've found that the majority of bids come in within the first couple of days the vehicle is listed. Then it seems if you're lucky and you have more than one buyer interested, you may get some additional bids come in. But I have never had a bidding frenzy at the end of a vehicle auction like I have with parts actions.

I guess the point I'm trying to make is for first time vehicle sellers is to not get their hopes up if they don't bids at the first of the auction. Chances are they aren't going to get many at the close of the auction either.

[Formulabruce]

Originally Posted by 455HOGT37

I have my 63 Cat project on eBay right now with no reserve and no BIN. It's a straight auction with no games. The opening bid is not rock bottom, but is still lower than I expect it will sell for. In the last week I have had two bidders meet my opening bid, let it ride for a few hours, then retract the bid.

So my guestion for all the eBay veterans out there: What's their motivation for doing this? I can see someone hunting for a reserve price, but I have no reserve. Also, I can see if these were my own buddies bidding on my behalf trying to run the price up, but they are not.

What gives?

Lets actually ANSWER these.
1. Motivation.
A. Possible they want More notices from ebay, as a bidder you get told when you are outbid, etc, and you are less likely to miss the end of the auction.
B. They saw another car or item they wanted more and retracted.
C. Re read the description and found it wasn't what they thought. Example a "post" car, vs a "Hard top" ( 99% of Bidder do NOT completely READ the descriptions. Its like Porn for them and they look at pictures FIRST!)
2." Your buddies", like many other "buddies" on ebay are often "shill bidders", this is another reason for last second auctions, to keep shills from driving the price up.
I shill bid for a friend once on a transmission, I ended up winning the auction.... he sends me a bill.. LOL, so I just said thats the last time I do this, and went and paid for it and picked it up ( 69 4 speed)
Lastly. As has been stated, Sunday eve is good ending, just not on Superbowl Sunday.

[Gulliver]

My experience has always been late, last-minute action when selling a car. I've had excellent results with the last bidder paying, but some friends have not. One guy I know who does a lot of cars on eBay only closes about half his deals. I attribute this to poorly written descriptions, and some non-disclosure issues. Leave nothing out that a potential buyer would back out on. Better to honestly document the car in photos and ad copy, the market will always decide what it's worth. Everything I've listed has sold, been paid for, and with positive feedback. Maybe I've just been lucky.

The only strategy I know of is to bid the max you'd really give for something, and you either get it or you don't..the rest is just playing mental games with yourself.