Stories of misers and cheapskates....

[swlovinist]

I love this site, for the info and what it has to bring to the table, but recently, I have been asking info on some unique items and have gotten mixed reviews. Half of my responses are filled with honest, reliable( and worthy) information that I could take to the grave, while others have been lurking vultures just waiting for me to pawn it to them for cheap. I am in no way bashing this site or anyone affiliated with it, I was just wondering if anyone else has had these encounters buying and selling. I dont want to offend anyone, I just wanted to politely state that I have noticed that there are(some) people who visit this site who are taking advantage of others and what they have. Is there anyone else who feels this way or is it just me? Am I the miser?

[Ze_ro]

This is probably not what you had in mind, but I have my own story of misers...

Me, and a friend of mine are pretty hardcore collectors... there was a time when we'd go out every weekend together and roam the city looking for good games to buy. Luckily for us, we live fairly close to a flea market that almost always has some pretty good stuff, so we used to go there fairly often. Unfortunately, most of the sellers at this flea market have no idea what the prices are, and have kept them ridiculously high. There's a guy there who still has an original PSX priced at $125 (it's been there at least 6 years), and a Gameboy Pocket for $75. The worst offender though is a corner booth that is entirely walled in, and sells a lot of VHS movies. It's run by two old women, and we always refer to them as "corner lady" (I'm not sure which one is which... I guess we call them both "corner lady"). In addition to all their VHS stuff, they also have plenty of video games behind a glass counter, and then used to have boxes full of Atari and INTV games (although those have since disappeared... they told us they were going to sell them on eBay, but I have my doubts that that ever happened). They actually have some very interesting stuff! They have a huge amount of Master System and NES games, and they even have some oddities like Jaguar, Saturn, 32X, TG-16, and 3DO games (That stuff doesn't show up around my town very often). However, they seem to have no concept of depreciation, so you'll see Genesis NHL 93 priced at $22, and various other "deals".

Luckily though, there's a table right at the front of the store that has MUCH better prices. He doesn't have nearly as much rare stuff, but I often find obscure SNES games there for reasonable prices... he gets the odd Atari game... and he's usually willing to bargain on his prices.

Anyways, one day my friend and I walked in, and we noticed that the guy (I think his name is John) had Cosmic Carnage for the 32X priced at $4. I didn't have a 32X at the time, but my friend did. We made note of it and kept looking. We went over to corner lady's booth and found Cosmic Carnage again, priced at $12. Just to prove a point to ourselves. Brian offered her $6 for the game. She laughed at us and said no... so we went over to John and my friend gladly paid $4 for the game and we left. We toyed with the idea of shoving the game in corner lady's face and laughing at her pricing, but we're not that mean I guess.

Considering there are probably only 3 or 4 people in our entire city that would even be remotely interested in buying 32X games in the first place, I fully expect that cartridge will be there for a very long time to come. I imagine it will outlive corner lady herself.

Amazingly, I later went on to buy a Vectrex (working, and in good shape with Hyper Chase) off of corner lady for $40. My friend and I are still shocked about that one.

--Zero

[jonjandran]

ALL THE TIME !!!!!!!!!!

I get some downright silly low-ball offers when I sell things on the Buy and Sell Forum.

But then again I've given lowball offers before.

I don't get mad because I figure "what the heck I probably would have tried to get it cheap to "

So now I don't try to sell my "good" stuff here. I put it on Ebay. I just sell my extras and common stuff here. (unless someone reads this that I currently have sold something to or am in the process of doing so. That stuff is the "good" stuff I promise.) ;)

[maxlords]

I tend to lowball when I have no money and make fair offers when I have some. Overall, it just depends on the prices you want. If you want eBay prices, this isn't the place for it usually.

It's uncool to lie about hte value of something to try and get a score though. If it's OFFERED at a low price, sure, take it, but to deliberately tell someone it's worth very little or offer WAY below what something is worth...well, that's not so cool. I guess I'm a vulture that offers good advice :) I've gotten a lot of lowball offers myself...I just ignore them or say no thanks. Ultimately, it's not NEARLY as bad as the offers I used to get on gametz. Those were the worst. "I'll trade you a copy of GTA3 for your $100 game, and if you want my copy of [$20 Game X] it'll only be another $50! It's a deal right?"

[brykasch]

This is kinda a pet peeve of mine. I have no problem with people offering low for things. Especially things I want to get rid of. Like for example 12 for a 15 item etc. But people who offer 25 when you are asking 100 for something that is worth more than 100 is insulting. But I think alot of times people get lowball offers are people who don't make prices available on things they are selling. Myself I don't make offers, you list a price I like it and buy it or I don't. But alot of this is like baseball cards. Yes thye are all worht certain prices, but only things that are highly desirable, or rare will fetch close to book, most end up getting about 50-75%. Like the guy who had raiden project, game only. I offered a brand new Wild Arms 3, and 15$, plus shipping. He wanted 2 other ps2 games or 4 other ps1 games as well. I told him thanks but no thanks:) If it wsa complete we may have talked more but not for loose game that goes for about 25-40 on ebay.

[bargora]

I think that your offer for his bare Raiden Project was more than fair. Bare discs? Bah.

[Darth Sensei]

Well, I can see both sides. I get annoyed with people who say, I've got all this stuff, PM me with offers. I am very reluctant to make offers in that situation. If you have a price in mind, state it. If you ask for offers on something generally valued at 100 and someone offers $40 you should not be offended. $40 is what the item is worth to them. Period.

If you're buying and selling, then you're doing business. One must have a thicker skin when doing business.

However, if some offered a Game Park for sale and asked for say $200, and then I de-rail the thread by saying, "It's not worth more than $50" then that's insulting and wrong.

Just my 2 cents.

D