When low offers don't go anywhere.

[escuintla]

Continuing with the sage or ridiculous offers, here it is, something I witnessed.

1990s, I am at this garage sale in Palo Alto CA. This guy, a cheap "I can't mention the word",  well known by many of us garage sailing people, some Ebayers, me? a collector and gathering things to send back to my country of origin (for resale).

He gets earlier than us to this beautiful garage sale, very common those days, not anymore. He grabs this glass orb, something so beautiful, even if you didn't sell it, it would be a nice ornament on your mantle or desk.

The guy, finds the seller and ask for the price, the seller says $20. He yells What!? I will give you $5!

Seller replies: No way man! This is a rarity, my grandma had it before she got married.

Guy: It's not worth $20!...….we are waiting for him to drop the thing on the table, but he knows we are around.

Seller after 10 minutes of going back and forth with the price: Hey guy! Bring that thing here, and the guy obliges and hands him the glass thing.

Seller: How much did you say you wanted to pay?

Guy: $5 for that piece of sh...…..!

Seller: Grabs it, and slams it against the ground, the thing breaks in hundreds of pieces.

Guy: Deer eyes, jaw to the ground, he can't believe it.

Seller: OK, there you are, can I have my $5 now?

[transamcc]

Thank you for a forthright reply.  At least a buyer knows where they stand, and can consider a better offer to you, or move on, or BIN.  Auto decline or a prompt seller decline, or a seller counteroffer is quite acceptable.  It is not rocket science, or it would been covered in my college courses leading to my aerospace engineering degree 5 decades ago.  The annoyance is a seller just sitting on the offer with no intent to do anything. Maybe if buyers had the option to "withdraw"  an offer for the reason "seller is ignoring me" it would work better and ebay would see the flaw.   I made an offer 6 years ago on a $100 plus listing to  a seller who overpriced his peers by at least 30% on everything listed. I made a fair offer about half way between his price and the average of his peers for the same condition (used) product.  Seller sat and sat and sat on my offer. At 47+ hours he countered with a generous price reduction of 8 cents off the BIN. I declined and  have not been back to those listings, and since my regularly used searches are bookmarked in the browser with "exclude items from" , I will never intentionally see that person's listings again. Did seller block me?? I have no idea and have not been curious enough to even look.

[escuintla]

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@turquoisetulips wrote:

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My cousin Shirley and her family lived in Redwood city CA. for many years before they moved to Penn valley . She was an avid  bargain hunter. She had even managed to find  three antique bathtubs at different times  with the claw feet.   She cleverly  integrated them one at a time   into her home decor . It wouldn't surprise me if  you unknowingly  had crossed paths with her at some point in the past. Tulips 

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It depends on when she was garage sailing over here. Back in the late 90s, early 2000s, we knew what any buyer was doing. We knew the guy driving that 12V cylinder van and just stopping by and in a minute of glancing over the items he would pick up a bunch and then ask questions as a flea market reseller. Ebay then was a secret, a name you wouldn't pronounce because you would be telling others to be your competitor.

So, we knew the guy only interested in books, the other guy in musical instruments, the guy or girl dealing with art, and so on. We had so much comradery, we would joke about finding the book, art, or the record of our life time just to get the interested party looking at us with the ope eyes as "dang! I missed it!" 

[div_style]

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@transamcc wrote:

  It is not rocket science, or it would been covered in my college courses leading to my aerospace engineering degree 5 decades ago.

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I bet what you learned then is about as useful today as the physics degree I got at about the same time,  (IU,  '66) when my electronics textbooks had no mention of transistors and we were just beginning to find uses for microwave technology.

[myjunqueyourtreasure]

AFAIK you CAN retract an offer. I've had it happen to me as a seller, but not sure if that option is still available.

[myjunqueyourtreasure]

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@transamcc wrote:

I see your point. I then state that this goes back to the thread that a buyer should have an option to choose the duration of a best offer.  Another thing ebay should do, even if this option is provided, is to give the seller a defect for every best offer that they fail to respond to.  To ignore an offer until expiration with no response is rude at the very least. I am not looking for "favors" but placing realistic offers on what appear to be greedy prices in light of the current market value.

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Really? A defect? You live on ebay 24/7 do you? Sellers don't either.

It's really not up to you to tell the seller what his prices should be, no matter how entitled to a lower price you may feel.

[tellmemama]

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@transamcc wrote:

I see your point. I then state that this goes back to the thread that a buyer should have an option to choose the duration of a best offer.  Another thing ebay should do, even if this option is provided, is to give the seller a defect for every best offer that they fail to respond to.  To ignore an offer until expiration with no response is rude at the very least. I am not looking for "favors" but placing realistic offers on what appear to be greedy prices in light of the current market value.

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So let me see if I have this right...you want to add yet another defect for sellers who don't answer your offers?  I'm guessing you've never sold here, have you?  Plus your idea of a "realistic offer on what appear to be greedy prices" is subjective to say the least.  All of this gives me the impression that you only want things done your way in your time frame.  I don't know how to tell you this, but life doesn't work that way. 

You also might find this hard to believe, but some sellers don't sit at the computer all day waiting to respond to your offers.  Oddly enough, some sellers even have the nerve to have lives outside of selling on eBay.  Can you imagine?

I try to keep abreast of messages from buyers but I've been known to walk away from my desktop for hours at a time and have even left my phone in a completely different room than the one I'm in.  For.  The.  Whole.  Day.  Therefore on occasion I may not respond to a question for several hours after it has been asked.  Does that make me a bad seller then?  Should I get one of those defects for not jumping high enough when you tell me to?

But I never list with best offer so I don't have a dog in this fight.  Carry on.

<edit: spelling>

[transamcc]

That degree  served me very well for 36 (continuous) years in aerospace and computer science industry prior to retirement in 2005, both in hands-on and management roles .   thank you

[transamcc]

The only listed reasons to withdraw a best offer are "cannot contact the seller" and "entered wrong amount".  I guess if I did not offer big enough to get a seller's response,   I "entered wrong amount".  Or, if I get no answer in the 48 hour time frame , I cannot "contact the seller", but by simply making the offer,  I am still technically "committed to buy" if you ever respond prior to offer expiration.

[transamcc]

I never intend to sell here.  I came several years ago for the nationwide garage sale and never left, but do not live on ebay 24/7 either. My definition of realistic is based on the average prices of what your peers have listed as BIN for that item/condition and the completed sold listings of that same item in the past 30-45 days, yes, realistic.  48 hours is a long break for a seller to depart from the helm other than weekends, holidays and vacations.  Everyone takes breaks, but 2 days at a time when you have active listings?

[transamcc]

Yeah sort of......the risk is because the seller is sitting on it, I cannot technically withdraw my offer by ebay rules without bending them and claiming "wrong amount entered " ,  "seller changed description" or "cannot contact the seller".  Now if I go to another seller and buy, I still have an offer here that technically I have to honor if the seller accepts it. I usually do NOT need duplicate items so I then must either bend the rules to withdraw, hope the seller declines, or sends a counteroffer which I can then gracefully decline.   I am not looking for favors, just a timely answer so I can move on.  Sellers apparently are not even required to respond to offers although the short text of ebay buying/bidding only states the seller can accept, decline or counter your offer. Way down in the wording it indicates "listings or offers may expire prior to seller response"  in which case the offer is not binding.

[escuintla]

I still have somewhere license plate stickers, documents, you name it from an individual working for the NASA at the Moffett airfield in my area. Now is the Lockheed taking care of that area. 

Garage sales are few nowadays, the new immigrants have destroyed that hobby by kicking out the old folks. I drive by Palo Alto once in a while, and I remind my wife that when she was pregnant (2003) we were able to stop at almost every street there to attend garage sales. Nowadays, I drive by and that town seems to be like if the zombies ate them all Palo Altans. 

Look at this, a real find in San Jose, at $250, I hesitated to buy it. 

[castlemagicmemories]

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@transamcc wrote:

I see your point. I then state that this goes back to the thread that a buyer should have an option to choose the duration of a best offer.  Another thing ebay should do, even if this option is provided, is to give the seller a defect for every best offer that they fail to respond to.  To ignore an offer until expiration with no response is rude at the very least. I am not looking for "favors" but placing realistic offers on what appear to be greedy prices in light of the current market value.

You can choose the duration of an offer.  You can choose to make one, knowing that it may take 24 -48 hrs, or it may be responded to more quickly than that, or it may expire, or choose to just buy it now outright, or choose to find another listing.  You do have choice, no one forces anyone to make a best offer.

Responding is like feedback.  Sometimes no response IS a response. and both are voluntary.  Defects for sellers not responding is inappropriate in the extreme, especially in view of the fact that you want to dictate their response time!  They may not even be available in the time period you designate.  Rude is in the eyes of the beholder, and you have no way of knowing why the seller is not responding.  

The seller has the right to price their merchandise at whatever they think the market will bear.  They are not required to price at what you think is the proper price.  Yes, they are doing you a favor in considering a lower price.  They have what you want.  And if they don't want to sell for your price, you won't get the item you want.    It's not up to you to determine who is greedy and who is not.  It may be that your ideas of prices are simply too low.  Are you aware that work goes into acquiring items, listing them, taking pictures, researching, having packing materials, packing items, etc?  

If you don't like the prices, and you don't like the Best Offer process,  then you may be very limited in what is available for you to buy.

Good Luck.

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[castlemagicmemories]

  I made an offer 6 years ago on a $100 plus listing to  a seller who overpriced his peers by at least 30% on everything listed.

I would have thought you would buy from his peers then.

[castlemagicmemories]

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@transamcc wrote:

Yeah sort of......the risk is because the seller is sitting on it, I cannot technically withdraw my offer by ebay rules without bending them and claiming "wrong amount entered " ,  "seller changed description" or "cannot contact the seller".  Now if I go to another seller and buy, I still have an offer here that technically I have to honor if the seller accepts it. I usually do NOT need duplicate items so I then must either bend the rules to withdraw, hope the seller declines, or sends a counteroffer which I can then gracefully decline.   I am not looking for favors, just a timely answer so I can move on.  Sellers apparently are not even required to respond to offers although the short text of ebay buying/bidding only states the seller can accept, decline or counter your offer. Way down in the wording it indicates "listings or offers may expire prior to seller response"  in which case the offer is not binding.

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Just don't make Best Offers.  Then all of your problems are solved.  With all due respect, if you cannot or will not conform to the conditions that may occur with it, the it isn't for you and will only continue to cause you unnecessary angst, so you should not use it.  Just buy it now.  

[castlemagicmemories]

That clock is gorgeous!