The Knuckle Heads on Flebay

[twocool4u]

Felix,

I find something I want, maybe an old out of print book like this:

http://cgi.ebay.com/FIREARMS-CURIOSA...item4aa63be22d

I would put in on my watch list and make a note of when it ends and decide how much it is worth to me. At about 5-10 minutes to auction end I would log into my ebay and open the auction. At 60 seconds to go I type in my maximum bid and at 9 or 10 seconds to go I click "bid". No muss, no fuss, I either win at a price I can afford or I lose and find another action at a later time. No one knows I am even interested in the item so anyone else who has bid or is going to bid is less likely to bid high.

The best I have ever done is a book that was last printed in 1917. It was worth between $700 and $900. I got it for $33 after shipping. It is the pride of my library.

[felix]

Thanks, TC. So, you enter the bid, hopefully the last one for the product, manually at the last second. That would be the way I'd do it too should I be in the resale business. Prolly, I would write a program to do the shooting if I had to make a living using these sites. ... felix

[a.squibload]

I rarely do fleabay any more, mainly due to their anti-seller bias, rules are tilted toward buyers.
You could easily lose if the buyer makes a fraudulent claim, for example
"box was empty" or "item significantly not as described". Buyer/crook wins,
then sells your item later.

I did list a 60's Dinky Toy car, no box, hoping to get 5 or 10 bucks, sold for $36.

If you're looking for small items for cheap (I got 3 bottles of Goo-Gone for $4 shipped, and batteries are usually cheap)
and don't want to drive around to find 'em,
it's just easy to order from someone who bought a few cases and is selling individual units.

Anything really cool will usually be overbid.

[Ozark Howler]

Recently purchased a "like new" C-H 444 4 station press on Fleabay for $43.99. this press was listed as a Adein USA press. Also the next day I picked up a Bair Brown Bear 3 station "H" press for $53.00

The deals are out there, you just need to be patient and know the item you are bidding on, the C-H was listed as a Adein USA press which actually was mis-read from the Made in USA base casting, it was obvious from the beginning that it was a C-H 4 station

Both presses were won in the last 30 seconds.

[Charlie Sometimes]

The Feebay seller knows how many people have looked at, and are watching their items.
As a buyer, you can look at the number of bids and bidders and figure how bad somone may want it or if it is near someones max bid- intuition somewhat.

A bid will keep an item from being withdrawn before an auction ends, too- provided it is above any established reserve.

"Sniping" is not only for resalers, but money savers, too. I do it to avoid spending more than I wish for an item I'd like to have/need, or to keep from loosing that item to those with more money than sense.

Timing is everything, too. If your item sells around game kick off time, or during the afternoon board meeting, quitting time on the East or West coast, or similar events, you can figure low profits. You have to think ahead- does it end on a weekday or weekend?

More power to a capitalist market and economy- it supports what it will support, and no more. It's up to the participants to decide what, when, where, how, and why things are done.

[Down South]

I remember once, I was bidding on a three passenger tube to pull behind my party boat. The same seller had a "Buy it for now" for the exact same item just a couple spaces down from the bidding link. I decided to bid and make my bid just below the buy it now price in the other link. Some bid idiot bid higher than the buy it now price. I laughed about that one and went to the buy it now and bought it.
Maybe they just get a kick out of winning the bid, who knows? Some folks just have more money than sense.

[dudel]

eBay - bad for buyers; great for sellers. I was thinking of a new Lee universal decapping die, so as not to have to move it from the RockChucker to the 550 toolhead.

Not one of them on eBay was cheaper than I could get it new from Midway. Just amazing.

OTOH, this week, I received a new improved swager rod for my RCBS pocket swager. It was better, stronger and cheaper than the RCBS replacement (which bent swaging .223 pockets).

Some deals out there; but they seem to be few and far between.

[Char-Gar]

Last week I bought a good Lyman 311291 4 cavity mold on Ebay. I thought the price was reasonable for this out of print four cavity mold. It is available from a custom small batch maker, but for quite a bit more than I paid for this one on Eaby.

[Down South]

Last week I bought a good Lyman 311291 4 cavity mold on Ebay. I thought the price was reasonable for this out of print four cavity mold. It is available from a custom small batch maker, but for quite a bit more than I paid for this one on Eaby.

Deals can still be found on Flebay. I use them as a source for price checking too.
I can find many common items for a much better price at a buy it now price compared to buying retail. The bulbs that I mentioned in an earlier post on this thread were $6 a piece at Lowes. I bought name brand bulbs on Flebay still in the original packaging for pennies on the dollar and I bought two dozen of them for $20 shipped.
I still wonder if Lowes had the correct price on those bulbes. I looked at them twice and kept thinking "WOW" that seems to be a high price.
I just went to Flebay to verify the price and number of those bulbs that I bought and it was correct, 24 for $20 shipped compared to $6 for 1 bulb.
The bulbs were Halogen 20 WATT JC G4 Base Light Bulbs 12V, Trisonic brand.

[a.squibload]

Well, maybe I'll check there more often, I usually only use Fleabay for small stuff.
Definitely will watch for those Adein USA presses!

[garym1a2]

Many gun related items on ebay are sold to people in other countries that cannot get the stuff in their country thru conventional means. Three years ago I needed money and sold off my extra stuf. Prices went much higher than I expected and most of the buyers where from Italy and France.

[chasw]

I bought an older Mitutoyo dial caliper from someone on ebay for about 25 bucks shipped. Pristine new ones were going for 60 dollars or more, but this one had a small scratch in the crown and the needle zeroed at about 3 oclock. Therefore, the snipers didn't want it. A simple accessory from Mitutoyo allowed me to reset the needle to 12 oclock and now I have a measuring instrument that puts the common RCBS and Lyman calipers to shame. - CW

[PAT303]

I just got a brand spanker lyman 257418 mold with handles for $53 Aust delivered,I love ebay. Pat

[bbailey7821]

I'm feeling and agreeing with the general disgust with the whole flebay situation. The good news was that last week I sold a $27 dollar Lee press for $46! Guess some people don't know about MidwayUSA...

[mtnman31]

Right now there is an Ideal/Lyman mold on there sitting at 500 bucks. It is a single cavity and looks like a Pope design. I am not a "collector" - I'm only interested in molds that I plan to use. For 500 bucks I could have custom molds made in a bunch of different calibers. I know if I was the seller of that mold I'd be pretty darn excited.

[Daddyfixit]

Right now there is an Ideal/Lyman mold on there sitting at 500 bucks. It is a single cavity and looks like a Pope design. I am not a "collector" - I'm only interested in molds that I plan to use. For 500 bucks I could have custom molds made in a bunch of different calibers. I know if I was the seller of that mold I'd be pretty darn excited.

Yea, untill he finds out the bidder ment to bid 50.00!

[pathdoc]

Midway and such other stores provide excellent prices, true, but it's no good to us non-US shooters to whom they will not ship ANYTHING. I'll use E-bay for things I can't get elsewhere and/or which aren't made any more.

I've found the discussion on E-bay psychology fascinating - and it applies to a whole lot more than just firearms stuff. The only thing I really find obscene about it is the shipping, which is sometimes many times higher than the final price of the item.

To all those who've offered their hints, tips and tricks - thank you.

[Johnny_Cyclone]

Hey, there is one good thing about this high demand time period.
It's that a bunch of folks are putting some pretty classic stuff up on the auction sites that would have normally been left to rot in a barn, wind up as scrap metal, or in the dump.

"Jeeze what are we gonna do with all Gramps weird garage junk?"
"Well someone at work said that folks are buying this kind of stuff like crazy on the auction sites. Let post it on there before we haul it to the dump"
"ok"

I don't think I've ever seen so many Pacific 366 reloaders for sale. Lyman Tru-Line Jr's, or Herter's presses. etc.

Now they're all back out there on the market, and when the new buyers need some cash or tire of'em we may have a shot at them for reasonable prices