I am always amazed when people overbid on boxes. I was bidding on a 2 box lot of Tazan. It ia now at $90+. The boxes go for $40 a box at Blowout. I dont know if people get too involved in the moment or just dont know the retail price. Go figure

I think it's probably both. For certain, people get caught up "in the moment" and want to win their auction, even if they know they are over-paying. Or perhaps they think that a particular item is more rare than it is, and figure this might be their only change at getting it.

Then there are the poeple who are truly clueless about retail pricing. One of my recreational pursuits is backpacking, so occasionally I'll look on Ebay for used gear to replace/supplement what I have. I've been bidding on items that have ended at well over full retail, to the point where you just shake your head in amazement. And it's not like it was an item(s) that wasn't readily available or you couldn't go online and order from REI or one of the many outdoor gear outlets. Crazy!

For some, that might actually be a savings as shipping is much less per box if you're buying two than it is one, especially if you're from another country.

There can be a few reasons for overbidding beyond just ignorance of prices and/or sheer stupidity.

An item that may be readily available in one area, might be quite scarce in another.

Similarly items that may be at bargain prices in one place, may never be sold for that in other places.

People may be following price guides.

Someone may have information or may think they have information that an item may be raising in demand, hence they will pay more now.

Someone may not mind overpaying just to get the item. That falls under a lack of patience.

Someone might drop a higher maximum price thinking that no one will run them up to it. Come to think of it, that is sheer stupidity.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Raven,

Hello Gerry609. We are both from island. You live in USA State. I live in a USA Territory.

Big factor I saw from sellers is always the shipping. In special the International limitation. Take a close look. Many sellers just sell to continental USA. I noted that many of these sellers never get higher bids selling their boxes compare to other sellers without International limits.

For example some time ago was a seller with auctions of DC vs. Marvel Jumbo boxes. Every week he has a box for auction. The higher bid as far I remember was $40, but the average was $25. Meanwhile other sellers manage to sell the same box with higher bids.

I sell International. There is a lot of collectors. Also just check membership here.

Hi kane1 I know what you mean, but this seller i have bought from regularly. His shipping is a flat rate through out the fifty states. (Not sure about Territories though. It sold for $90.99 + $10.95 shipping. Blowout would be $80 + $7.43 shipping (48 States). I always bid my highest amount i am willing to part with. I also do look to see what boxes are going for on the internet as i do hate to overpay.

Ok, you said it. The seller is more open to ship than Blow.

I'm not a power cosmic omnipresent top rated sellers, but in eBay my International sales in 2012 were 20% and for 2011 were 27%. For that reason I believe shipping limits can be an important factor.

Also one more thing. Remember never compare auctions to BIN (Buy it Now or fixed price). Because some people still believe they can get better prices in auctions. So they search 1rst for this type.

On occasion I've put in a high bid on an item when I can't be there for the end thinking it will never get that high. I've been burned a few times but for the most part it works.

quote:

Originally posted by John Tirohn:
On occasion I've put in a high bid on an item when I can't be there for the end thinking it will never get that high. I've been burned a few times but for the most part it works.

i ve put my daniel craig 40th anniv on ebay twice,not a sniff,now i see it on ebay currently with 11 bids at £214.00,mine was a lot less than that but no one wanted it ?

quote:

Originally posted by cheifbrody:

quote:

Originally posted by John Tirohn:
On occasion I've put in a high bid on an item when I can't be there for the end thinking it will never get that high. I've been burned a few times but for the most part it works.

i ve put my daniel craig 40th anniv on ebay twice,not a sniff,now i see it on ebay currently with 11 bids at £214.00,mine was a lot less than that but no one wanted it ?

But did you start your listing at 99p like the one on eBay you're talking about ? I've found if you start listings at a reasonable price, quite often no-one bids while 99p starts do attract bids but frequently go for peanuts

Also, I assume you mean 50th anniv otherwise that might explain why noone bid on it.

I never over bid on Ebay.

Cause, i never win anything either.

quote:

Originally posted by Kennywood:

quote:

Originally posted by cheifbrody:

i ve put my daniel craig 40th anniv on ebay twice,not a sniff,now i see it on ebay currently with 11 bids at £214.00,mine was a lot less than that but no one wanted it ?

Just out of curiosity, did you list your card under the appropriate eBay category? If it was under another, general category, people might not have seen your auction.

Does anyone ever really search by category anymore?

I mean, you have to put it in something but if you want to find cards you have to have a broad search or you'll miss the bargains.

Ed

quote:

Originally posted by Gerry609:
I am always amazed when people overbid on boxes. I was bidding on a 2 box lot of Tazan. It ia now at $90+. The boxes go for $40 a box at Blowout. I dont know if people get too involved in the moment or just dont know the retail price. Go figure

Since I've been on Ebay for close to 15 years now, I can tell you that there are several things that have an effect of final values of items.

One thing is the time of the year... for example, specialty items (including collectibles) have a tendency of selling a bit higher during the holiday shopping season. Also affecting sales and prices of collectibles is the time from late February to mid-April, when people are getting back their income tax refund checks.

Another thing that may influence Ebay prices (especially collectible cards) might be location and the amount of card shows being held. I have noticed a dramatic decrease in the amount of card shows in my area in the last 2-3 years or so. And to travel to a nonsport card only show takes a bit of travel (and expense) to attend such shows.

I guess it really may boil down to buyer interest... just as in a live auction, all it takes is 2 people to start fighthing over an item. At that point, just sit back and watch the fur fly!

quote:

Originally posted by Scifi Cards:
Does anyone ever really search by category anymore?

I mean, you have to put it in something but if you want to find cards you have to have a broad search or you'll miss the bargains.

Ed

I do So I really am missing out on alot of bargains?
My thing is most of the time when I'm searching, it is not necessarily for one specific card, it's usually a search for lots of cards in the one set say like "Buffy" or "Firefly" or "True Blood" or "Game of Thrones" under the category trading cards. If I put any of those searches just under a general search I'd be going through pages and pages just trying to find one trading card amongst all the other stuff, let alone to 10-20 cards I might be looking for in that set.

How do you guys go about searches like that?

I think I am going to have to change my ebay searches... I hate to think I'm missing out on bargains

quote:

Originally posted by Juelle Lou:

quote:

Originally posted by Scifi Cards:
Does anyone ever really search by category anymore?

I mean, you have to put it in something but if you want to find cards you have to have a broad search or you'll miss the bargains.

Ed

I do So I really am missing out on alot of bargains?
My thing is most of the time when I'm searching, it is not necessarily for one specific card, it's usually a search for lots of cards in the one set say like "Buffy" or "Firefly" or "True Blood" or "Game of Thrones" under the category trading cards. If I put any of those searches just under a general search I'd be going through pages and pages just trying to find one trading card amongst all the other stuff, let alone to 10-20 cards I might be looking for in that set.

How do you guys go about searches like that?

I think I am going to have to change my ebay searches... I hate to think I'm missing out on bargains

The most I'll narrow down a search is to the Collectibles category. I've found autograph cards listed in the autographs section and lots of cards that have a category just listed in the "general" category.

I've even searched the sports categories before, some of these shop dealers list non-sport there too.

But I'm giving away secrets here... I better stop.

Ed

quote:

Originally posted by Scifi Cards:

quote:

Originally posted by Juelle Lou:

quote:

Originally posted by Scifi Cards:
Does anyone ever really search by category anymore?

I mean, you have to put it in something but if you want to find cards you have to have a broad search or you'll miss the bargains.

Ed

I do So I really am missing out on alot of bargains?
My thing is most of the time when I'm searching, it is not necessarily for one specific card, it's usually a search for lots of cards in the one set say like "Buffy" or "Firefly" or "True Blood" or "Game of Thrones" under the category trading cards. If I put any of those searches just under a general search I'd be going through pages and pages just trying to find one trading card amongst all the other stuff, let alone to 10-20 cards I might be looking for in that set.

How do you guys go about searches like that?

I think I am going to have to change my ebay searches... I hate to think I'm missing out on bargains

The most I'll narrow down a search is to the Collectibles category. I've found autograph cards listed in the autographs section and lots of cards that have a category just listed in the "general" category.

I've even searched the sports categories before, some of these shop dealers list non-sport there too.

But I'm giving away secrets here... I better stop.

Ed

Indeed. Years ago I made a decent flip on some LOTR autos I found listed in hockey lol.

There's nothing strage here. Seller has a very reasonable international shipping rate and blowout doesn't ship to outside US....

quote:

Originally posted by Juelle Lou:

I do So I really am missing out on alot of bargains?
My thing is most of the time when I'm searching, it is not necessarily for one specific card, it's usually a search for lots of cards in the one set say like "Buffy" or "Firefly" or "True Blood" or "Game of Thrones" under the category trading cards. If I put any of those searches just under a general search I'd be going through pages and pages just trying to find one trading card amongst all the other stuff, let alone to 10-20 cards I might be looking for in that set.

How do you guys go about searches like that?

I think I am going to have to change my ebay searches... I hate to think I'm missing out on bargains

More often than other places, the key cards are posted in Sports Memorabilia instead of Trading Cards. You can do your searches on "everything" and then look to see what categories are popular for the listings. And if you get too many "hits" you might find an attribute that you can exclude, like -promo or -2010 etc.

I put limiters on my searches and sometimes save complicated searches for later edits, but I can end up pushing the 100-character limit for the search string - especially if I have to deal with alternate spellings. It got more complicated when eBay stopped allowing wildcards in searches, so I can't just put in "auto*".

Sorting by lowest-price-with-shipping helps me to see bargains. But if you're looking for 10-20 cards in a set, you might have to do it in phases, like "game of thrones" (auto,autograph,autographed) (clarke,coster,kit,lena,bean) and then for instance (shadowbox,shadow box,die,sp3) instead of the autograph search.

Oh, and I just passed the milestone of my 10,000th purchase from that auction site. Dang, these cards can be addicting.