Tips and Tricks for Buying
I know we see a lot of threads with sellers perturbed about low-balling buyers. Well..... this thread ain't for those sellers or our beloved, general whiners.
A lot of us are in this to make a living buying to sell. We make our money when we buy. I took this time for those folks. I am all for assisting others here to do better.
Thought it might be useful to some of us to share the tricks of the trade. I will start:
I use several buying accounts. When I run across something I want, whether the listing accepts offers or not, I watch the listing from a couple of accounts to see if they will send an offer. Let them get the ball rolling my way.
If they do, I get the offer on both accounts. I respond and see if a deal can be made. Perhaps some back and forth if counter offers are allowed. If an offer gets declined by the seller at some point, I wait 3 or 4 days and then come back from the other account and try again in the same price range.
Quite often, the seller will take the offer right the bat or at least come down further in price after missing the sale several days ago.
If that fails, I just move on to another seller that I might have already started working on...... Make a note on a spreadsheet if the listing was really desirable and come back in a month or two on another account to see if the price might be more negotiable at that time. That works as well on some sellers.
I have the best luck doing this with the business/commercial type sellers that need/like the cashflow and have a lot of items to work with. They don't care and want to make a deal. If they don't, I take my business elsewhere.
I do realize that sellers can see the buyer location in the eBay communication, but not many make that observation/note to identify me as the same buyer.
mudshark61369
·3 months ago@lakefor94 ,
I do not buy on ebay for possible resale on this site or others I mostly collect. I do however buy some items for resale at the live shows I sell at, some of which are specialty shows like vintage sci-fi collectibles, movie memorabilia, vintage toys... etc. At times I do need to add some variety to my stock of items, so I do use many of the same tactics used by @gurlcat , but I also:
Look at sponsored listings to see what kind of offers I get sent. Some times countering offering the received offers. I've been surprised at how good some sponsored offers have been.
I make note (my own off line version of a watch list) of interesting items and their item numbers and date them to see if they are still listed 30 or more days later, when a seller might be more interested in accepting offers.
Depending on what I'm interested in, I may send a note to a seller who does not have best offer on their listings, stating my reason for making the offer sometimes noting the sold item price range, then ask If they will consider an offer.
Sometimes I do searches for Newly listed along with Price: lowest
I've developed short, (3 words at most general searches) and have found items not listed in more specific ones. Sometimes selecting different categories of an unsuccessful short word search results, brings up items in categories most would not think of searching in that did not appear in an All Categories search.
I make lists of sellers whose username suggests they list things in categories I might be interested in.
gurlcat
·3 months ago@mudshark61369 That's funny because I mostly avoid sellers with any jewelry-related username. But it makes sense because while you are an 'end-user' buyer who would benefit from sellers who know what they have, I as an inventory shopper am looking for the totally clueless sellers. 😆
The username is just one indication; there's also things like whether they have mannequins and other jewelry displays, know which brands are popular, know how to photograph jewelry well, etc.
I'm looking for a guy who inherited his mom's house and is just aiming to get a few bucks for her costume jewelry (probably after taking out any gold pieces -but not always!!) so he scatters them on a towel, photographs them while slightly drunk, and calls them 'Lot of Assorted Used Jewelry' or something.
mudshark61369
·3 months ago@gurlcat ,
"it makes sense because while you are an 'end-user' buyer who would benefit from sellers who know what they have, I as an inventory shopper am looking for the totally clueless sellers."
Having a semi ready source of things I can flip easily does help if I need things to fill in holes in my stock. However, my short word searches are where I often run into the clueless sellers and closet cleaners. Last night one of my short word searches turned up an auction for a rare variant of an item for a very good price that I won as the only bidder. I found it in a 2nd category search. It will go into my collection, while the more common version I have in my collection will go to a live show.
lakefor94
OP3 months agoQuite a few of our posters are quite tight lipped about sourcing and I understand that. Bringing this one back to the top to see if anyone wants to share tips/tricks on general buying practices on eBay or elsewhere.
I know we have a some hustlers out there. How about you, @gurlcat ? You have hustle pasted all over you.
Anything to share?
Anyone else?
gurlcat
·3 months ago@lakefor94 Ha, the multi-account buyer idea is pretty brilliant!
Hmm, I do have a bunch of little strategies, but I should say they are very different for when I'm shopping for some household item vs. inventory shopping. There may be a little bit of overlap, but for the most part I'm a very different animal depending on my 'prey'. 🤣
And even my strategies for inventory buying may be too specific to help anybody else, because my main category is vintage jewelry and I usually shop for bulk lots rather than individual pieces, and my strategies are geared toward that. Maybe people who sell things like coins, tools, trading cards and other small or small-ish items that are findable in bulk lots would benefit from those tips, but IDK.
But here's a very basic strategy that works great.
Start a search with keywords that aren't TOO specific, so you don't miss listings where the sellers didn't use those words.
Do any left-screen refinements you want (I do U.S. only, for example).
While you're there, select Auctions
Go to the sorting menu (top-right-screen pull-down), and select 'Ending Soonest'
This will enable you to see the auctions just about to close, so you can snipe them. I use a sniper bot, which I highly recommend over manual sniping.
After you have looked at as many potential auctions as you want to go, as far as how long you're willing to wait to see if you won, reverse this refinement/sorting dichotomy. That is, switch from Auctions to Buy It now, and from Ending Soonest to Newly Listed. NOW you'll see the newest listings of what you're seeking, and grab the best deals before anybody else can.
mudshark61369
·4 months ago@lakefor94 ,
I mostly list items as auctions, so I do not run into the Best Offer issues. However, I did try it out when it was rolled out on both my auctions and BIN listings. Both of which were for collectible one off items, not multi quantity listings.
I stopped using it on my auctions, because I'd wake up in the morning and see that one or more buyers blew through their 5 available offers often starting with 50% or more below the starting bid price over a 15 to 20 minute period. The BIN offers were more reasonable but still to low, so I quit using the feature on all of my listings, about 2 weeks after it was introduced.
As for those buying for resale my opinion is; I'm not in business to make a customer money.
tobaccocardyahoo
·4 months agoThere are and have always been some sellers who feel they make their money when they buy, and collect it when they sell.
They do not want or need low-balling buyers to have money.
Many sellers who can easily restock and really do not invest much time or thought in selecting their inventory may be more tolerant of low-ballers, but those who are really good at doing business with readily available inventory are concentrating their efforts and sales on sites like Amazon which do not make it easy to run your business like a stall in a souk or bazaar.
Most of the sellers I know who sell on both Amazon and Ebay who are selling brand new, in production products do most of the business on Amazon.
I do not accept low-ball offers because I am committed to the type of merchandise I offer, and will not poison the Terapeak numbers and kill future sales of the product at a fair retail price.