Who here hates on-line sellers sometimes?

[Badhornet]

I just bid the most I'm willing to bid for an item. If I win great, if I dont then thats fine too. At least I know I didnt feel I overbid. Ebay has always been a crapshoot

[wiggyx]

No, sniping is how you get something for as cheap as possible. You don't leave time for someone else to raise your bid. Putting in more than anyone else is willing to pay simply means that you're leaving it to everyone else how much you pay. If you put a max bid of $10000 then you're sure to win most everything...but you'll also end up overpaying for a lot of it.

"you're leaving it to everyone else how much you pay"

I hope that I'm understanding what you mean by this. You're ALWAYS leaving it up to other people bidding against you (if there are any) to determine what the final sale price will be. Instead you're proposing that we should fight fire with fire (sniper against sniper)

eBay isn't an auction house, you have no idea what someone else is bidding. Snipers will bid last second no matter if you've already bid or not. If they bid more than you're willing to pay, then kudos for them. If not, congrats, you won.

[Aussie2B]

Sniping is to deal with the people who don't put in their max bid. There are a lot of bidders who will incrementally bid just for the purpose of claiming the top bidder status. When they get outbid, then they just make another bid. If you bid at the very end, you can outsmart them by not giving them enough time to reclaim the top spot. If you bid earlier, they'll either chip away at your lead, forcing you to pay more, or will outbid you. I've never used an automatic bidding program myself, but I often do wait until near the end. There are times when I wish I placed my bid even later since if I leave a minute or two remaining, the bidder I outbid will have enough time to place some more bids.

[jb143]

Sniping is to deal with the people who don't put in their max bid. There are a lot of bidders who will incrementally bid just for the purpose of claiming the top bidder status. When they get outbid, then they just make another bid. If you bid at the very end, you can outsmart them by not giving them enough time to reclaim the top spot. If you bid earlier, they'll either chip away at your lead, forcing you to pay more, or will outbid you. I've never used an automatic bidding program myself, but I often do wait until near the end. There are times when I wish I placed my bid even later since if I leave a minute or two remaining, the bidder I outbid will have enough time to place some more bids.

This. This is how most people seem to bid. Either they don't realize that ebay will up their bid for them or they want to think they will get it for as cheap as possible. Just look at bidding history and you will see it's true. They almost always make the lowest possible bid until they are the highest bidder. It makes no sense to do it this way. What they could end up doing is getting into a bidding war with someone else doing the same thing.

Now on the other hand, lets say that someone bids $1.00 on something early on in the listing. They check back every day and see if someone outbid them. Now you want it so you bid $20. The auction now sits at$1.25(or whatever) Then they see that and bid $1.50, then $1.75, then $2.00, then decide to give up when they hit $10.00. Well, if you had waited until the end(and provided no one else was bidding) then you could have won it for $1.25 instead of $10.50. This is why snipping works.

Having said that though, I tend to prefer Buy it now listings...so much less drama.

[wiggyx]

Sniping is to deal with the people who don't put in their max bid. There are a lot of bidders who will incrementally bid just for the purpose of claiming the top bidder status. When they get outbid, then they just make another bid. If you bid at the very end, you can outsmart them by not giving them enough time to reclaim the top spot. If you bid earlier, they'll either chip away at your lead, forcing you to pay more, or will outbid you. I've never used an automatic bidding program myself, but I often do wait until near the end. There are times when I wish I placed my bid even later since if I leave a minute or two remaining, the bidder I outbid will have enough time to place some more bids.

Ebay is a system if you know how to work it only people’s initial bids will determine what you pay.

As an example, say a lot of games goes up starting at $.99 for 7 days and this lots estimated value is $100. I want it but I don’t bid till the last 20 seconds so I watch for now, by day two it has say 4 bids and is currently sitting at $5.50 with someone on the winning side with a max bid of say $25.00 because like the OP he wants to get the lot cheap. He sits with the winning bid all the way till the end, So he assumes that hes going get a great deal when he wins. He might sit there with the mouse on the “1 click bid” button but if no one has pushed past his $25 bid by now why would they? So he keeps his max bid where it is. Then someone like me comes and in the last 20 seconds and puts a max bid of $90. The guy doesn’t know what to do he was so sure it was won he might have enough time to do one or two “1 click bids” but not enough to put in a new max bid. So now I just won a $100 lot for about $29 and if another sniper did it for more than $90 I wouldn’t have time to even try another bid and would lose or if bid up to my max I would pay as I was willing to do from the start.

Edit: Basically what Aussie2B said.

The logic still seems broken to me, and it's largely because you assume you're the only person that's bidding last minute, and that the person whom you are bidding against hasn't entered their max bid from the get-go.

Let's say your max is 90 bucks and you bid in the last 20 seconds, and I do the same but with a $100 max, then I win. It didn't matter one bit that you waited until the last second to bid. And if $90 was your max and there's a bidding war going on, or I had bid my max of $100 on day one, then it wouldn't have mattered anyway. Other people will be bidding last second, and that gives you just about zero advantage.

Sure, if one guy is bidding and hasn't entered the highest price that he's willing to pay, AND doesn't do a very good job of watching the auction at the very end, then you are correct, it will be easy to outbid him last second and win. Assuming that someone bidding against you in the last 30 or so seconds "doesn't know what to do" is just that, assuming. You "know" what you're doing, so you could just as easily assume that he does too.

I've bid on PLENTY of auctions where someone has chipped away until they hit the max bid that I or someone else holds in the last minute or so. Whether they chip away with 30 days left or 30 seconds doesn't matter, there are folks that will do so either way.

The method that you guys prescribe may have an amount of efficacy in certain, rare instances. But it's hardly the norm, at least in my experience with eBay in the last 13 years. All that said, I've employed your variety of tactic in the past. I found it both time and energy consuming, not to mention a waste of both on most occasions.

EVERYONE has a price limit, sniper or not. Racing against the clock doesn't guarantee that yours is the max or that someone else isn't a better sniper than you.

[Bojay1997]

The logic still seems broken to me, and it's largely because you assume you're the only person that's bidding last minute, and that the person whom you are bidding against hasn't entered their max bid from the get-go.

Let's say your max is 90 bucks and you bid in the last 20 seconds, and I do the same but with a $100 max, then I win. It didn't matter one bit that you waited until the last second to bid. And if $90 was your max and there's a bidding war going on, or I had bid my max of $100 on day one, then it wouldn't have mattered anyway. Other people will be bidding last second, and that gives you just about zero advantage.

Sure, if one guy is bidding and hasn't entered the highest price that he's willing to pay, AND doesn't do a very good job of watching the auction at the very end, then you are correct, it will be easy to outbid him last second and win. Assuming that someone bidding against you in the last 30 or so seconds "doesn't know what to do" is just that, assuming. You "know" what you're doing, so you could just as easily assume that he does too.

I've bid on PLENTY of auctions where someone has chipped away until they hit the max bid that I or someone else holds in the last minute or so. Whether they chip away with 30 days left or 30 seconds doesn't matter, there are folks that will do so either way.

The method that you guys prescribe may have an amount of efficacy in certain, rare instances. But it's hardly the norm, at least in my experience with eBay in the last 13 years. All that said, I've employed your variety of tactic in the past. I found it both time and energy consuming, not to mention a waste of both on most occasions.

EVERYONE has a price limit, sniper or not. Racing against the clock doesn't guarantee that yours is the max or that someone else isn't a better sniper than you.

Again, this is absolutely correct. People who claim sniping gets them cheaper wins or some other advantage seem to have some mental picture of either a bidder that is too stupid to bid what they really are willing to pay for something or not aware of sniping or last minute bids and who just bids once and only bids in response to getting outbid. In my experience at least in bidding on video games, neither bidder really exists or if they do, there's always several other people who outbid them anyway long before they become the deciding factor in the final auction price. Some people snipe and some people bid huge amounts from the get go. Either way, if someone bids more than I am willing to go, they win the item.

I recall trying to explain this to my dad the first time he used Ebay to bid on some coins last year and he just couldn't get over the fact that if "he had only bid another dollar", he could have won the item he was bidding on. Once I explained to him that you never can be sure what the other bidders or snipers maximum bid really is and that while they had technically only paid one more dollar than his maximum bid, if he had bid another dollar, he still probably wouldn't have won, he seemed to understand it a lot better. Unfortunately, it looks like some fellow collectors still don't get how Ebay auctions work if they believe that sniping somehow gives anyone an edge or results in paying less for everything. If you're winning with sniping, that's awesome, but you're still bidding and paying more than anyone else that bid on the item within the time limit of that particular auction, so you're not exactly getting away with anything.

[Natty Bumppo]

Snipers can outfox themselves sometimes. Depending on the item (and when it ends) I try to put my maximum bid in about one minute out. I have won some auctions just under the margin of my maximum bid from a sniper who if they had the time (and were watching) would have snapped to the fact that they could have had the auction with one more bid with just the next increment. If someone bids in that minute (and is under me) I will sometimes adjust my bid a bit to just go over whatever fraction of a dollar the person is using in case they bid again (assuming I have time).

[understatement]

Again, this is absolutely correct. People who claim sniping gets them cheaper wins or some other advantage seem to have some mental picture of either a bidder that is too stupid to bid what they really are willing to pay for something or not aware of sniping or last minute bids and who just bids once and only bids in response to getting outbid. In my experience at least in bidding on video games, neither bidder really exists or if they do, there's always several other people who outbid them anyway long before they become the deciding factor in the final auction price. Some people snipe and some people bid huge amounts from the get go. Either way, if someone bids more than I am willing to go, they win the item.

I recall trying to explain this to my dad the first time he used Ebay to bid on some coins last year and he just couldn't get over the fact that if "he had only bid another dollar", he could have won the item he was bidding on. Once I explained to him that you never can be sure what the other bidders or snipers maximum bid really is and that while they had technically only paid one more dollar than his maximum bid, if he had bid another dollar, he still probably wouldn't have won, he seemed to understand it a lot better. Unfortunately, it looks like some fellow collectors still don't get how Ebay auctions work if they believe that sniping somehow gives anyone an edge or results in paying less for everything. If you're winning with sniping, that's awesome, but you're still bidding and paying more than anyone else that bid on the item within the time limit of that particular auction, so you're not exactly getting away with anything.

Never said I was getting away with anything or that others don't know just giving others less time to react thus having a chance (not a safe bet but a chance) to get an action for less. It's not like I'm putting a $2K bid down on Super Mario in the last few seconds just to win, it's always a bid that I'm willing to pay if it's maxed out. If I put my absolute max bid down the first day there a chance someone like your Dad coming along and saying "just one more dollar and I'll win" till it happens, I'd rather just let them think they have it won and at the last few seconds put my bid in and not give them time to bid one more dollar. I don't see how its that hard to understand.

[PROTOTYPE]

“1 click bid” button but if no one has pushed past his $25 bid by now why would they? So he keeps his max bid where it is. Then someone like me comes and in the last 20 seconds and puts a max bid of $90. The guy doesn’t know what to do he was so sure it was won he might have enough time to do one or two “1 click bids” but not enough to put in a new max bid. So now I just won a $100 lot for about $29 .....WOW! that's how it exactly happen too. A 7 day auction it was sitting at 9.99 and 4.00 shipping, there was no traffic on the meter and I was the only bid. But I had a feeling there was someone else wanting this game too.The other games were really crap, So put a max bid of 29.00 on it.he hit it with 2 sec and won because I had no time to re-bid.. I really didn't know how much this was worth to me, looking back I should had put more. E-bay really is about luck or trying to get the seller to end the auction early, which I didn't try.

[understatement]

"you're leaving it to everyone else how much you pay"

I hope that I'm understanding what you mean by this. You're ALWAYS leaving it up to other people bidding against you (if there are any) to determine what the final sale price will be. Instead you're proposing that we should fight fire with fire (sniper against sniper)

eBay isn't an auction house, you have no idea what someone else is bidding. Snipers will bid last second no matter if you've already bid or not. If they bid more than you're willing to pay, then kudos for them. If not, congrats, you won.

Ebay is a system if you know how to work it only people’s initial bids will determine what you pay.

As an example, say a lot of games goes up starting at $.99 for 7 days and this lots estimated value is $100. I want it but I don’t bid till the last 20 seconds so I watch for now, by day two it has say 4 bids and is currently sitting at $5.50 with someone on the winning side with a max bid of say $25.00 because like the OP he wants to get the lot cheap. He sits with the winning bid all the way till the end, So he assumes that hes going get a great deal when he wins. He might sit there with the mouse on the “1 click bid” button but if no one has pushed past his $25 bid by now why would they? So he keeps his max bid where it is. Then someone like me comes and in the last 20 seconds and puts a max bid of $90. The guy doesn’t know what to do he was so sure it was won he might have enough time to do one or two “1 click bids” but not enough to put in a new max bid. So now I just won a $100 lot for about $29 and if another sniper did it for more than $90 I wouldn’t have time to even try another bid and would lose or if bid up to my max I would pay as I was willing to do from the start.

Edit: Basically what Aussie2B said.