Somebody explain 2014 Ebay to me.......

[Duck Rodgers]

I hadn't sold anything on there for about 6 years until yesterday. I put a bunch of old video games on there because I figured Gamestop would give me about a nickel(literally) for each of them...so I would've been happy getting $10 out of them. Just didn't want them around anymore. 3 day auction. First day...no bids. Next day....one $1 bid. Then this as time starts running out:

Of note, Mr. Buyer32150 bids against himself multiple times. And then Simpleman2208 brings the bid up $30 at the very end, when he could've just bid up $1. How does any of that make sense? Are these just auto-bidding computer programs messing up or something? I was more than pleased with the results though whatever the case.

 

[Darkwing Duck]

What were the games?

 

[TroutBum]

If the bid is only a dollar, you can make a max bid of whatever you want. Say you bid TNT bucks, it will still only show that the high bid is $1.00 until someone bids 2.00. At that point, it will tell that bidder that he has been outbid and the new bid price is like three bucks and you're still the high bidder. It will go on like that until someone bids more than your max bid of ten bucks. If nobody else bids on the item, you get it for $1.00, not your max bid.

So if you really want something, pt the max you're willing to pay as your bid.

 

[Duck Rodgers]

What were the games?

Bioshock
Bioshock 2
Too Human
Mass Effect
Fallout 3/Oblivion double pack
Call of Duty: World at War
El Shaddai
Splinter Cell Conviction
The Bourne Conspiracy
Far Cry 2
Kanye and Lynch 2
Battlefield Bad Company
Dark Messiah
Resident Evil 5
Fable 3

I'd say I paid an average of 5 bucks for each of those initially; some were $2, some $8-10. Just used from Gamestop or Amazon. Some only in sleeves, some in crappy cases. So I basically recouped any money I spent on video games over the past 6 months or so minus a few $$$, so that's pretty cool. I think I'm going to start Gamefly finally now though since I don't really care if I hold onto games or not.

If the bid is only a dollar, you can make a max bid of whatever you want. Say you bid TNT bucks, it will still only show that the high bid is $1.00 until someone bids 2.00. At that point, it will tell that bidder that he has been outbid and the new bid price is like three bucks and you're still the high bidder. It will go on like that until someone bids more than your max bid of ten bucks. If nobody else bids on the item, you get it for $1.00, not your max bid.

So if you really want something, pt the max you're willing to pay as your bid.

So are you saying there are hidden bids that aren't being displayed? Because I get what you're saying, but the $30 gap and the consecutive bids still don't make sense in that context.

 

[Jason]

People can rebid a new max that they're willing to pay even if they're the high bidder already. This protects them from last second snipers stealing it away if they are willing to pay more.

Sent from the JazzFanz app

 

[VINYLONE]

If the bid is only a dollar, you can make a max bid of whatever you want. Say you bid TNT bucks, it will still only show that the high bid is $1.00 until someone bids 2.00. At that point, it will tell that bidder that he has been outbid and the new bid price is like three bucks and you're still the high bidder. It will go on like that until someone bids more than your max bid of ten bucks. If nobody else bids on the item, you get it for $1.00, not your max bid.

So if you really want something, pt the max you're willing to pay as your bid.

So are you saying there are hidden bids that aren't being displayed? Because I get what you're saying, but the $30 gap and the consecutive bids still don't make sense in that context.

Duck, the troglodyte is spot on with his explanation of how the bidding goes. As far as the $30 gap goes, that was simpleman's max bid so that's what's going to show until it's surpassed...jayberg in this case beat it by a dollar. Its the same thing with the consecutive bids. If you go by the time line, those bids are all made within a minute or so...so that means the bidder is sitting there thinking that he or she is going to bid a certain amount and then changing their mind and going up a little more.

 

[Duck Rodgers]

Duck, the troglodyte is spot on with his explanation of how the bidding goes. As far as the $30 gap goes, that was simpleman's max bid so that's what's going to show until it's surpassed...jayberg in this case beat it by a dollar. Its the same thing with the consecutive bids. If you go by the time line, those bids are all made within a minute or so...so that means the bidder is sitting there thinking that he or she is going to bid a certain amount and then changing their mind and going up a little more.

The timeline is even out of order though. For instance, the winner's bid occurs before the previous bid to that.

I think maybe the key is I just need to look at that thing as an after the fact summary, and not an actual play-by-play of the entire bidding process. It makes more sense that way.

 

[VINYLONE]

Or just don't worry about it and reap the profits! Also, make sure you're only shipping to a confirmed address via the PAYPAL GUI.

 

[Avery]

It always looks like people are bidding against themselves but it's them simply having to re-bid once they receive the message that their current bid is still not the highest.

I usually just do Buy It Now as auctions typically have lower selling prices than Fixed Price listings.