Yes, I’ve done that. I needed a V-selectable Dominator for my chum in LA and, for some reason, Dominators went through a period of attracting few bids. This seller went twice with my bid being the highest but under his reserve. After a bit of e-haggling, we agreed on £120.

Incidentally, I suffered the other sniper’s problem tonight. I stumbled on a Kalamazoo Model One with an hour to run and a silly price. I kept the window open and fricked about answering emails etc. Suddenly remembered the auction and went back to it but ten minutes too late. It sold for under $110 which is just criminal for what is a Gibson GA5 in a different box. I know, I don’t need it. But less than £55, I ask you…

Then all you have to do is send them a message after the auction and make an offer to the amount you was prepared to bid, they usualy take the offer as they cant be arsed waiting another week for the listing to complete.

There’s still the prob for snipers that sellers get nervous and pull the auction “because of an error in the listing” and relist with a big reserve. It recently happened with a Park I was watching. I think seemingly big bids (say £300 or more) go in with days to go on JTMs, AC30s and the like because that’s still a fraction of what they’ll go for in the end. If they all stayed at £0.99 with 5 secs to go, sellers will yank them.

Only the bidders who bank with Barclays show their hand before the last 10 secs. Im a big time sniper.

[quote=”rjhalsey”]Snipping is good snipping is my friend! :twisted:[/quote]

You haven’t got a new Ovation by any chance? 😆

Snipping is good snipping is my friend! 😈

I lost out on beautiful Ovation Deacon 12-string last week. Some sod got it in the last 5 seconds of the auction, and for only a couple more quid than I’d bid. Definitely a snipe. It should be banned.

[quote=”Michael”]However, the fact still remains… too many people bid 6 days before an auction even finishes, pushing the price too high. I guess an auction site needs those sort of people to operate.[/quote]

Yeap, that’s true. It’s really mind-numbing sometimes to see so many people who don’t get it.

[quote=”Michael”]However, the fact still remains… too many people bid 6 days before an auction even finishes, pushing the price too high. I guess an auction site needs those sort of people to operate.[/quote]

So many people get caught up in the auction. It makes it hard to find a decent deal on ebay anymore. I use esnipe. I put in the maximum price I am willing to pay and I leave it to do its job. If I win cool, if I didn’t it went for more than I was willing to pay. The best place I have found for good deals on guitars is Craigs list. I scourer the major cities looking for good deals. Most will except paypal as payment and ship the item to you. I have not had a deal go sour yet, knock on wood( my head).

Ralphie

I don’t purchase much on eBay but when I do I use sniping software. My one and only high bid goes in mere seconds before auction close. I’m usually at the beach or someplace else while simultaneously winning an auction. There are several automated sniping solutions out there. Get smart, get sniping software.

I love esnipe!

I can’t spare the time to snipe like I used to. I leave a max on something I’d like, but I might as well stick my bare arse on the wall with a “spank me” sign hanging underneath. Always come home to find it’s gone for two quid more. A really unpleasant feature of eBay is that anyone can “search by bidder” to find out what I’ve placed bids on. I had a (presumably) left-handed, 5-string bass playing, valve amp owning, total PITA pinging me on allsorts.

The real beauties, say a 60s AC30 TB, will attract $$$ bids early because peeps can’t help themselves. Often, the bidding is still a fraction of what happens in the last hour anyway. Otherwise, an owner with a no-reserve AC30 sitting at $1.99 and 30mins to go would likely spook and pull the auction anyway. Sniping is so prevalent that (even allowing for the sniper software users) I never put up a listing to end at something stupid like 2:30am. Killing yourself. I love to see other sellers making that mistake, though.

Those people are called amateurs Mike, and they can often be seen trying to feed the ducks rolled up tenners on a sunday morning. It is a well known medical condition called ‘Having more money than sense’ .

All us Pro’s only bid in the last 5 seconds of an auction.. quack quack.