auction v BIN on ebay

[Peter_Spaeth]

Just for the heck of it I just searched for PSA and $200 and up on ebay's advanced search. The breakdown between BIN and regular auctions: 22,599 BIN and only 327 auctions.

[mybuddyinc]

That's 69 : 1.
Never would have guessed it was that high, ebay must be very proud of themselves

[alanu]

I would guess sniping reduces the amount of $200 and above auctions, but still it's a big difference.

[deadballpaul]

I mostly just search for "auction" only items. Most of the BIN's are over priced for sure.

[barrysloate]

Peter- those numbers are so skewed it makes the old ebay model unrecognizable.

[Touch'EmAll]

With high(er) end PSA, playing both BIN and auction starting at one penny - sometimes you get disappointed with auction (aka recent PSA 5 T206 Speaker), then again the auction surprises you with nice results (aka T206 W.Johnson PSA 5 and 1949 Bowman Paige PSA 6) - toss up to me.

You always hold your breath a little with the auction - as the last day approaches and its far from your desired price.

From the high percentage of BIN's - people are willing to pay extra for a BIN situation, because they are too scared with auction.

steve

[Mark]

What is the ratio between completed BIN's above $200 and auctions above $200?

[marvjung]

BIN's are usually always higher - but on rare occasion, I do find a deal here or there (I've decided to make an attempt to complete the "monster," but in it's pure form - all 6,000+ cards and I've resigned myself 20 years to do it - no joke!).

I prefer to buy at auction and sometimes, I get great deals and sometimes, well, I usually pay market, maybe a tiny bit more, but not much to have any type of remorse.

I've also noticed that when it comes to the commons, those are fairly easy to get; it's the HOF'ers, rarities, difficult backs, where I end up paying quite a bit more, but that's ok as I love to hunt those.

[Matt]

Originally Posted by Mark

What is the ratio between completed BIN's above $200 and auctions above $200?

Great Question! It's not letting me sort completed items by auction type - anyone know how?

[Peter_Spaeth]

An even more interesting question would be what percentage of BINs have been up there for over a year.

[Mark]

Peter
Yes, but those eternally present BIN's serve at least one purpose: they let me know the price at which many of my cards will not sell. By telling me what the cards are not worth, they are something like a poor man's VCP.

[Peter_Spaeth]

40 auctions, 4408 BIN

[calvindog]

Originally Posted by Mark

Peter
Yes, but those eternally present BIN's serve at least one purpose: they let me know the price at which many of my cards will not sell. By telling me what the cards are not worth, they are something like a poor man's VCP.

LOL this is so true. When you see a card on BIN which you already own, you pretty much know what price the card will NOT sell for.

[dennis]

after 6 months i would think these "sellers" would lower their price on the BIN. (or at least offer a make an offer.) i have been outbid many times only to see that the buyer has put up the same card that they just purchased and more than doubled the price as a BIN. these cards never sell,at least if these sellers got the cards graded maybe they would have a chance to sell at double what they bought them for. oh i forgot if they get them graded they quadrouple the price! don't these sellers realize that people who might buy these cards know what they should sell for? these sellers should be embarressed.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Perhaps they think the recovery is right around the corner.

[Exhibitman]

Ebay has made it nearly 10x more expensive to auction cards rather than offering them at fixed prices. Ebay charges $0.35 to list a $200 item for BIN and $3.00 to list an auction with a $199.99 minimum bid. If you want to do a $0.99 minimum and a reserve of $199.99, you pay $2.15. So do I post my ten weekly items as BINs with best offer levels allowing for someone to make an offer ($3.50 total cost to me) or do I put them up in auctions costing me $21.50-$30.00? in a weak market, where every cent counts, the up-front costs alone are a consideration for a casual seller.

The market on Ebay also sucks right now on most categories of cards. Lowball bidders are doing quite well. I'm throwing down very low bids on a lot of cards and winning a surprising number of them lately. Do I, as a rational seller, want to sell into that meat grinder with no price floor? Since I don't do this for a living, I'd rather keep the cards than throw them away at a loss or at little profit, which is what a straight auction often means lately.

No, sellers are responding to external and Ebay-based stimuli about as they would be expected to under the circumstances. Unless Ebay takes steps to reverse the financial incentives, the skewing towards BINs will go on.

[familytoad]

I've got to say that this is the type of post that deserves a ton of viewership and an occasional ping to keep it near the top. The analysis of how much BIN costs as opposed to the standard auction format is so "dead on" that maybe there isn't much more to add..

But if for no other reason than to keep an informative post alive, can someone point out the search criteria instructions so that others can do the same ratio comparisons on different price ranges??
I'm interested in ranges both lower than the $200 on listed and much higher...just because I like to debate/discuss/analyze things.

Also, I am a ebay selling neophyte, so does BEST OFFER cost the same as BUY IT NOW? If so that might further explain seller motivation or intention (although we probabaly already know that an unrealistic BIN price is only meant to separate the unknowing from their cash)

Thanks
Brian L
familytoad
Ridgefield WA

[tbob]

I agree on the BIN prices being generally too high lately but there are still bargains to be had with BINs if you are lucky enough to stumble upon the right card at the right time. As far as pre-war cards go, if there is a BIN on ebay which has been there over 24 hours and no one from this board has banged it, it probably is going to go unbanged

[Exhibitman]

Basically, they are complementary and are not any extra cost. You can use a BIN with a Best Offer to let people bid on your BIN items. Say you have a card you want to list with a $2,000 BIN but you'd gladly take $1,800 and if push came to shove you'd take $1,500. You do a BIN at $2,000. Ebay lets you set a range of Best Offers, one to take automatically and one below which you automatically reject the offer. You set the automatic accept at $1,800 and the "go away" floor at $1,500. If an offer comes in between the 2 you have 48 hours to review and decide whether to accept it. If an offer comes in above $1,800, it is accepted automatically and the auction closes. If one comes in below $1,500 it is rejected automatically.

I've been very happy with the results using this set up. One trick: set the floor and ceiling Best Offers at odd numbers, like $1,798 or$1,499 rather than whole numbers. Seems to help.

If Ebay did a better job of publicizing it I think we'd see more action on the BINs. It does take a bit of thinking, which I realize is difficult for many Ebayers.

[Matt]

Originally Posted by Mark

What is the ratio between completed BIN's above $200 and auctions above $200?

Anyone able to research Mark's question? Just a cursory glance looks like more $200 sales have been made through BIN then via auction.

[makersmarkambassador]

I don't know if this has been mentioned, but when you search, I believe it pulls from stores also. That may be why there are so many BINs. Just a theory...I may be mistaken though.

I know when I do a search, I always get sellers stores in the search. It's sure is annoying, because I rarely buy from stores anymore due to them being over priced.

[JK]

I realize that BINs have been historically high, but I wonder what effect the Microsoft Cashback program has had on BIN prices. My sense is that as more and more sellers realized that buyers were getting cashback discounts, they began raising their prices even though the cashback wasn't coming out of their pockets - the thinking being that they could list it for more and still make a sale since the buyers would ultimately net out around market price after receiving their cashback.

I also wonder whether ebay has had the desired results after shifting to a more store oriented business. It seems to me that the more overpriced BINs you have, the more you have buyers contacting sellers and trying to make "off line" deals for which ebay ultimately gets no cut.

[hanksta]

One thing about BIN vs. auctions is the final value fee, with an auction the fee is 8.75% and a BIN (fixed price) is 12%.

Either way eBay seems to get their money, the lower fee to list a BIN but a higher cost when it sells.

[Leon]

It seems to me that the more overpriced BINs you have, the more you have buyers contacting sellers and trying to make "off line" deals for which ebay ultimately gets no cut.

My guess is that this situation is happening far more than ebay realizes.

[Matt]

I think eBay has some message filtering in place that is preventing people from receiving such communications. They may have a filter out there for messages including terms such as "fees" and "email" that cause those messages to never get delivered.

[Kehfee]

Originally Posted by Matt

I think eBay has some message filtering in place that is preventing people from receiving such communications. They may have a filter out there for messages including terms such as "fees" and "email" that cause those messages to never get delivered.

I doubt it. Or if they do its not very good. I set up some BINS. (I actually wanted to sell mine so they went fairly fast)

Anyways, I had a number or requests to take the item off Ebay and do it privately.

[smtjoy]

I have had good luck with my BINs/Store Items, to me it all gets down to how you set your price. Price it near VCP and it will sell within a few months, price it a lot higher and it might never sell or could take 1+ years (the only cards I would price this high are very scarce cards that maybe come to market once every 2-3 years or 1/1 highest graded cards) or price it too low and it sells in less than 24 hours. Just seems like thats how my sales work out.

If you list 30+ cards having a store is the way to go as it only cost me .03-.05 a month to list them with the same value fee as the BINs and I only have the store monthly fee to pay.

I also have best offers on nearly all my cards and that seems to help a lot. I get a good amount of offers on them. I have even made trades with the cards I have in my store based on ebay messages I have gotten.

[alanu]

Just in my personal experience with listing with BIN's:

If listed somewhat above the amount I would actually accept I usually get the item sold with a BIN, a "Best Offer", or an off ebay offer. As mentioned above, if I don't get it sold in the first day or so, it rarely sells later.

If the items don't sell and I list them as an auction, it's about 50-50 whether they sell for more or less than my BIN.... the conclusion is:

I have no clue what is best.

[botn]

Vintage cards in general seem to be selling at significantly lower price points on ebay than prices realized would indicate from other auction venues. It is a risky proposition to list your cards on ebay without a reserve or a high opening bid. So is it that there are far more BINs than in previous years or simply less auction listings due to the unimpressive final bids?

[barrysloate]

I agree with Alan that it's difficult to know what the best route is.

I do straight auctions/no reserve and get great prices, average prices, and poor ones. And it's almost impossible to predict ahead of time. Generally I don't list my best pieces on ebay, and the ones I do I just want to move out, so if I lose a few bucks on some it's not the end of the world.

[Mark]

It sounds like ebay auctions are good for buying cards, if you can find anything you want to buy.

[ChiefBenderForever]

Something I have noticed lately is a lot of auctions being ended and then relisted again. Since most of the action happens in the final 20 seconds I'm not sure what the seller is hoping to accomplish, they should just list as BIN with best offer if they are that worried about final price as they probably annoy potenial bidders who just think it will get canceled again.

[HRBAKER]

Originally Posted by Matt

Anyone able to research Mark's question? Just a cursory glance looks like more $200 sales have been made through BIN then via auction.

I am not sure this is a valid question. God only knows how long most of those $200+ BIN sales were listed bf they finally sold. I routinely hit the "Auctions Only" tab as I have wearied of looking through the overpriced listings. I am ok with missing the occasional good deal not to waste my time.

[mfs-1]

I've always posted my stuff with a $.99 starting bid. I would be a little concerened about doing that with my much higher valued cards, but then I would stretch it to a 10 day auction.
I mean, if you really want to sell it, there's really no other way to go about it.
Sometimes I see BINs go, but why take the chance of the card not selling?
...unless you have the time. It still costs ebay fees if you dont sell it, and your time.