O/T Pet Peeve on Best Offers (Ebay)

[Archive]

Posted By: Jeff Lichtman

So I see a card on ebay which allows for a best offer. The card was sold on ebay a few weeks ago for about half the current "buy it now" price -- and I make a best offer for about the price that this very card sold for a few weeks ago. Now I know people on ebay (and otherwise) want to double their money in a few weeks but unless the rest of us are morons it's pretty easy to find out that the card being offered for sale is overpriced by 100% - based on the sale of the very card a few weeks back. Anyway, my best offer is not declined, not countered -- just ignored. WTF is up with that?

[Archive]

Posted By: Dan Bretta

There is a Nebraska Indians postcard on ebay right now with a $200 BIN or Best Offer...I made an offer of about twice what the average NI postcard sells for and was turned down. It will not sell at his price and it probably would not sell to anyone but me if he lowered it to my offer. He's just wasting his time and money on ebay with such a high BIN.

[Archive]

Posted By: Eric Brehm

I dislike the whole BIN/Best Offer game. It seems like more times than not the seller is just trolling for suckers. As a seller, I don't use that method; I always put things up for auction and let the market take its course. As a buyer, when I find something that I really want that isn't offered very frequently, and I am willing to bite the bullet, I have found that an offer of about 90% of the BIN price is usually accepted. But some sellers may have a lot more 'padding' in their BIN price than that, so it is certainly worth trying lower offers too (e.g. fair market value).

[Archive]

Posted By: Jason L

Jeff,
seller is lazy and lacks courtesy

Eric,
I agree. I just had a seller accept my Best Offer of 88% of BIN, but unlike Jeff's situation, seller's BIN was pretty close to market to being with...

[Archive]

Posted By: nbrazil

i dont see anything wrong with BINs/Best offers on ebay. This is the seller's perception of what this card is worth. He offers it to the public. See if anyone bites or offers something near to his price. If he overprices the card, so be it....he'll have to pay the listing fees. I dont see what the difference is between a BST post stating a price with the footnote "Willing to hear offers." At most, viewing these best offers are annoying.

Now, not responding to a person's offer or inquiry....that's rude. But, I've also had that on the BST as well.

[Archive]

Posted By: Richard Cline - RC

I think that no matter what anyone thinks of BIN or best offer,
the seller should at the very least show the courtesy of a response when a potential buyer submits an offer.

Think of it as if it was a potential sale in person, is the seller going to totally ignore the customer? I don't think so.

Again, they are just being inconsiderate and rude and probably lose potential clients this way.

[Archive]

Posted By: Jeff Lichtman

Oh, and for the record, the seller received a single offer for his card -- mine -- during the entire week it was up for auction. Gee, perhaps the 100% markup had something to do with that?

[Archive]

Posted By: Matt

Jeff - you sound very annoyed at this seller, but if he wants to overprice his cards, that's his business. I've had situations where I was able to win a card well below what it had sold for in the past. Should I then be expected to sell it below those prices as well, or would asking that amount be OK? In fact, even if a seller wanted to sell it for 10 times what it has ever sold for, I don't have an issue with it; he may be a moron and have to eat his ebay fees, but a seller can ask whatever he wants. That said, he should have the courtesy of responding to your offer.

[Archive]

Posted By: Dan Bretta

Well the NI postcard has been listed twice and so far mine was the only offer on it....and there was one time I listed a lot of empty vintage baseball boxes...about 50 of them with a BIN of $399...when I got an offer of $50 I ignored it. Was I rude to ignore that offer? Or was it rude of the buyer to make such an insulting offer?

[Archive]

Posted By: leon

I agree that there is no question folks should respond to all offers. A polite "no thank you" can go a long way in future dealings. With that being said I am sure you will agree that a seller can ask whatever they want to for a card. All you have to do is sort by highest price cards and you will see 22 out of the top 25 never get bids with either the BIN multiples too high, or just the same conclusion of the starting bid being multiples more than the value. It doesn't really bother me. I find it kind of amusing sometimes...People should always have the courtesy to respond ...and that especially goes for the BST area. Brian and I do want to know about crap going on over there.

There was a recent transaction on the BST where the seller said they would take paypal as an option and clearly stated that in the original post, but would charge the additional 3%. The potential buyer said they would take the card and AFTER that had a problem with the 3%.....That's the wrong way to do it. IF you accept an offer you accept their terms if nothing else is negotiated up front. Adding paypal fees, on the BST, is fine and if you are a buyer please don't disregard that caveat. The seller can ask for whatever terms they want to...You don't have to agree or buy the card(s)....regards

[Archive]

Posted By: T206Collector

<<I make a best offer for about the price that this very card sold for a few weeks ago.>>

You say "about" -- was it slightly less, slightly more or exactly the same?

If it was slightly less or exactly the same, then if I was the seller I would obviously not be taking that number. Heck, that's what I bought it for, and I'm looking to turn some kind of profit. Even if it's an offer that's only slightly better than what I paid, I'd probably turn it down for the same reason. Heck, if that's what you wanted to pay for the card, then you should have bid a few weeks ago at that price. The seller should not be penalized for nabbing it while the nabbing was good and, if he got it at a below market price for some reason, then he deserves a profit.

But it is rude not to respond at all to a best offer.




- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Visit http://www.t206collector.com for my T206 blog, card galleries, articles and more!

[Archive]

Posted By: jeffdrum

"Best Offer" is a misnomer, seller is under no obligation to accept any offer. Should be called "Make an Offer." I hit on about 40% of my offers. My impression like many others is that most people are trolling for someone who doesn't know what something is worth or doesn't care. And after all, if somebody is willing to "overpay" for something, on that day, at that time it was worth that. As I heard a retired ballplayer say of a current player, "He makes what someone is willing to pay him!"

No excuse for not making a polite refusal for any remotely genuine offer.

[Archive]

Posted By: barrysloate

I agree- you can decline any offer you want, but you shouldn't ignore them. Just politely say you are going to pass.

[Archive]

Posted By: boxingcardman

it is their card and they can offer it for whatever they want.

I really do not buy the whole "he paid this so sell it to me for this plus a buck" line of reasoning. I mean, if I found a 1933 Goudey Ruth for ten bucks, by that logic I am doomed to sell it for $11. I buy stuff all the time that I think is vastly undervalued. If a buyer comes along and offers me what I paid plus a little but I still think the card is undervalued, my answer is "no". If the offeror is rude (I've actually gotten offers that go something like "I know you paid X for this card so where do you get the nerve offering it for Y; I'll pay you Z") I admit that I ignore it.

Sic Gorgiamus Allos Subjectatos Nunc

[Archive]

Posted By: Eric Brehm

boxingcardman, I hear what you are saying, but I disagree slightly. I believe, perhaps somewhat naively, that some concept of fairness is appropriate for these types of transactions. If nothing else, it builds good will between buyers and sellers. Perhaps there are very few sellers who would be swayed by 'moral' arguments as to how they should set their prices, but as a buyer I certainly feel better when I know that I haven't been taken to the cleaners on a card purchase.

[Archive]

Posted By: Mark

There was a card I wanted and the seller had the Buy it Now price at $450 which was about double the going rate. I offered $225 but was prepared to go higher if he countered. His response was basically 'how dare you offer me such an insulting offer compared to my buy it now price!! Never bid on any of my auctions again!!!' After listing and lowering the prices two more times, he took a best offer of $250 from another buyer. Guess my offer wasn't so insulting after all.

[Archive]

Posted By: jay wolt

I don't use the Best offer option when I sell
since I feel that no one would pay the listed price
as if I listed it too high knowing I'd take a lower amount.

With that said.
I always thought if you offer a seller a price on his
lot he either accepts it or rejects it, I didn't know
a response was forthcoming or even a counter offer proposal
was due.

[Archive]

Posted By: Mark Steinberg

I agree with Dan on this... a very similar situation to the Nebraska Indains Postcard...

A seller was asking $500 for a $125 item that I really wanted. I offered him $200, and never heard back. I told him that he would never sell it for even close to his asking price, and he would not likely encounter a more interested potential buyer than me.

Still... no reply. Of course it wnt unsold. I think some sellers are just out to see who they can ream.

[Archive]

Posted By: Doug

I haven't had a lot of luck with the best offer feature buying or selling. Usually when buying I run into a card with a buy it now that's twice what the card is worth and if I make a reasonable offer it's usually ignored or countered with a price that's barely different than the buy it now. When I sell something I usually try to list it at what I consider a fair price with a little "bargaining room", but it seems like the great majority of the offers I get are less than half of what the card is worth. Given that, I still respond to all of them. If it's close to something I'd accept I will counter with the least I'd be willing to take. If it's ridiculously low, I just politely decline it and go on.

[Archive]

Posted By: dstudeba

Eric -

How exactly are you being taken to the cleaners if you pay fair market value?

[Archive]

Posted By: keyway

I never make an offer on any of these items. Ebay is supposed to be an auction site. I am also sick of all the buy it now stuff that pops up every time there is a cheap listing price day. Ebay should open up a for sale sight for all of these people.

[Archive]

Posted By: leon

That site is called "Ebay Stores"....all of that high priced stuff that sits there not selling gets dumped on low cost, or no cost, listing days into the auction area we sift through....

[Archive]

Posted By: Red

"The card was sold on ebay a few weeks ago for about half the current "buy it now" price -- and I make a best offer for about the price that this very card sold for a few weeks ago. "

You offered the buyer of the card about what he just paid for it? Out of curiosity how much money were you allowing him to make. Was it enough to cover the postage he also had to pay when buying the card and the Ebay and PayPal fees he must now pay when selling the card? If the card just sold a few weeks ago you could have won the card at that time with just one more bid, thereby cutting him out of the loop completely. It's also possible that if you placed that next bid he still would have won it at one bid or even multiple bids higher. Maybe he was prepared to pay 50% higher than he ended up paying, so why would he want to sell it now for less than what he was prepared to pay.

[Archive]

Posted By: Jeff Lichtman

Red, fair questions. The card was won a few weeks back with one bid -- the starting price on the card. No one bid on it for a week because it was overpriced as it was. Finally, the winner put a snipe in at the end and was the only bidder for the card -- thus making it clear to me and everyone else who watched the card that it was overpriced -- except to this one bidder. So maybe the bidder was willing to pay 50% more for the card; however, not a single bidder was willing to even pay what he paid for it -- and then he immediately tried to flip it for nearly double the price he paid for it, just a few weeks later. Still think my offer to pay what he paid for it was a bad offer, not even worthy of a response?

[Archive]

Posted By: Eric Brehm

dstudeba -- good question, I suppose you are right that I shouldn't feel ripped off as long as I get a price that is fair with respect to the current market. And of course, as a buyer, the choice is always mine.

But I guess it depends on the situation. For example if Levi Bleam (707 Sportscards) lists a card on eBay or on his website, I can choose to either pay his price, or not pay his price. I am not going to call Levi and ask him who he got the card from, how much he paid, how long he has been sitting on it, etc., just so I can feel good about the purchase. If I did, he would probably laugh in my face anyhow.

I was thinking more about situations where I am personally acquainted with the seller, and/or happen to know the sales history of the card in question. This happened recently where a card I wanted was listed as BIN/Best Offer on eBay, and I just happened to know how much the seller paid for the card, when he paid it, and to whom. I made my offer based on what I thought was a reasonable profit for him, and informed him that that was what my offer was based on, which he accepted. I wasn't willing to pay any more than that, even though maybe I could have afforded it, just because of the principle of the thing. As a result, I think everyone came out happy on the deal. I hope that makes sense.

[Archive]

Posted By: Cobby33

I love (not) the sellers who do not set an auto-decline at a given floor and email back, making some stupid comment about how they would "rather burn the card" than sell it at that price. Use auto-decline, Einstein, unless of course you enjoy being a tool.

[Archive]

Posted By: barrysloate

I will never understand the business model of having hundreds of items priced well above their market value, and virtually none of them will sell. And then a couple of months later, the same overpriced group will appear and likewise little to none of it will sell.

I like to start things low and let it ride. I achieve 100% sales, and while a few items may go lower than I hoped, the average is always equal to or somewhat better than I expected.

But to each his own.

[Archive]

Posted By: boxingcardman

Cobby: I didn't know there's an auto-decline function. Cool. I'll have to check that out.

Eric: I think perhaps where I differ most from other views here is over the idea that telling me what I paid for the card is a negotiation point. When I sell I really don't care why the buyer wants the card, who it is for, what he plans to do with it, whether it finishes a set, etc. It will not affect my price. I know what I paid for it and I know what I will take to sell it. Anyone who thinks that the vast majority of sellers will be cowed by a recital of what they paid for the card is just kidding themselves. Similarly, when I buy a card I do not begrudge the seller his profit as long as I feel I got a good deal. And I'm not just saying that. A few years ago I watched a seller buy a $3K+ card from a walk-up for $250. I offered him $1,500 on the spot, which he refused, and later I bought the card for $2,500, which was a fair price on a very scarce card.

Sic Gorgiamus Allos Subjectatos Nunc

[Archive]

Posted By: Jon Canfield

One of my favorite sales I ever made was when I offered a card for a $9.99 starting price and a BIN of $500.00 (what I wanted to get for the card). I bidder rushed to bid on the card to get rid of the BIN function. As the 10 day auction played out, the initial bidder who bid instead of using the BIn won the card - for almost $870.00. Needless to say, I was happy.

[Archive]

Posted By: Eric Brehm

boxingcardman - well, I suppose that if you are buying a card, then using the seller's investment in a card as a negotiation point (if you happen to know what it is) is always worth a try: "Hey you only paid $250 for that $3000 card, so you will be making out like a bandit if you sell it to me for $2500."

[Archive]

Posted By: Ed Ivey

I recently bid what I thought was market on one and got an instant rejection, like an out of office auto reply.

[Archive]

Posted By: leon

If you know what someone paid for something then that can certainly go into the thought process of an offer...however, to me what is much more important, is the fair market value. I have a standard answer for most folks that ask what I paid for something....it's usually "$1.00". (note obvious sarcasm).....I do use what I paid for something in determining a price but I use what I feel is fair market value more so.....I always answer questions and offers...no matter how ridiculous. Recently I was offered $225 for a card that I had priced at about $600....I paid $500 for it....I politely declined but the potential buyer and I had about 10 good emails that evening chatting about other stuff. I am sure if I was an ass, or didn't respond, we would have never had that nice dialogue....best regards

[Archive]

Posted By: Joe D.

I am beginning to dislike both sides of the Ebay Best Offer process.
It seems like a broken tool more often than not.


Jeff - the guy is fishing - plain and simple. He is hoping to catch something. Either that or he actually believes his ask is close to market value. I see a card on eBay right now that is 3.5 times the price it sold for here on N54 back in August. 3.5 Times!

Somewhat hopeless.... buyers are faced with cards way overpriced and are conditioned to offer half and less. Then sellers who list a reasonable ask price receive those '1/2 and less' lowball offers anyway.

nobody wins.

[Archive]

Posted By: Eric Brehm

Leon -- you are a wise man, with a fair and balanced attitude, and I think you are right, a buyer should be motivated only by what price they can get, not by how much the seller might or might not be gaining out of a deal. Push comes to shove, I am not in any big hurry to do business with a seller who makes small profits, if I don't get a good price on my end. On the other hand, I do think it is true, in baseball card trading as well as any other business, that a savvy buyer can use knowledge of the seller's position to their advantage in negotiating a price. What else is new. But I'm just a mathematician who lives in a dream world of ideals. And for some crazy reason likes vintage baseball cards.

[Archive]

Posted By: Cat (ret.)

Jeff:

I don't know if you mentioned this or not, but if your offer is unanswered and has not expired he may simply be waiting to see if he gets a higher offer. If there is no higher offer, he may accept yours. Offers have a certain time before they expire (72 hours ?). He may still come back at you and accept your offer, if the auction is still live.

I have had good luck with the best offer function. But right now, with a soft market, I am less inclined to BIN cards or make Best Offers since I feel like I am trying to catch falling knives.

[Archive]

Posted By: James Gallo

Here is one thing that has not been brought up.

What if something is so rare that there are no price points or very very few. How do you price it aside from a best offer? Often I let stuff build up so I will run a bunch of auctions at once but want to get it listed to "be seen".



I have a lot of stuff in my ebay store and most have best offer options. I am always willing to consider something however if I have something listed for $600 and someone offers me $11, that is rude on their part and they don't get a response. Let's assume that the piece is even overpriced and is on;y worth $300, is $11 a serious offer? Come on... Why are you wasting my time by reading the offer....


I listed a few high grade m101-5s and based my prices on other cards in people's store. After talking to someone about the card i made a deal that gets me about $500 in value. if I was offered the $500 cash I probably would have taken it, however for a high grade early card it is hard to price.


So I think these are a few reasonable points as to why people have high BIN and why some people never get a response.

James G

Looking for 1915 Cracker Jacks and 1909-11 American Caramel E90-1.

[Archive]

Posted By: JK

Eric,

Lets assume a seller picks up a card for 2k that has a fair market value (FMV) of 7k and lists it on ebay with a BIN for the FMV. If I understand your position correctly, you would expect that seller, assuming you knew the history of the card, to sell it to you for less than the FMV, say 5k (or 2k less than FMV) as he will still make a 3k profit. Fair enough. However, Im curious if the situation was reversed, say the seller picks up the card for 2k, but its only worth 1k. Assuming once again that you know the seller and the history of the card, are you willing to pay the seller 3k (or 2k above FMV) to insure that he still makes a profit?

[Archive]

Posted By: Dan Koteles

why would you only offer what or close to what he paid. He may have bought it relatively cheap and wants to make a little. You arent necessarily saying you do not want hime to make a profit...but what are you saying ? Plus ,if they recognize your name and realize you have a little cabbage....ah ,ya never know.

[Archive]

Posted By: bruce Dorskind

Whilst we find the discussion on Buy It Now Offerings on E Bay
to be quite interesting, it is, in our opinion academic.

We must remember four facts

(1) EBAY is a business. The objectives of the seller and buyer are
diametrically opposite. The seller wants to receive the maximum
price and the buyer wants to acquire the item for as small an amount
as possible

(2) There is not an established market for baseball cards. If one looks
at a random analysis of 100 pre-1960 high grade cards on Vintage
Card prices, one finds wild swings in many individual card prices.

If one looks at the sale of the same card in a Goodwin, Mastro, Memory Lane
and Huggins Scott Auction a (all within a 12 month period) prices often
vary as much as 200-300%

(3) Whilst it is not appropriate to ignore a response, we can assume
that the dealer or seller recognizes the differences between a "serious
offer" and someone who is nothing more than an annoyance

(4) Although the vast majority of BIN cards do not sell, some do and are
later auctioned at record prices. Over the past year a distinguished dealer
had an E 93 PSA 7 HOF on E Bay- for a high, but fair BIN/Best Offer Price.
Finally the card made its way to an auction house. The price realized with
the buyer's premium was within 5% of the last BIN price


This is America. Capitalism will always rule. Buyer beware. Seller beware.

Happy New Year!


Bruce Dorskind
America's Toughest Want List

[Archive]

Posted By: Mike

When Ebay becomes like a show we are all in trouble. Having attended about a dozen Nationals it is amazing how many dealers like to display their collections (not inventory) with astronomical prices. Cards that go for $100 on Ebay are priced over $250.00 with little room for movement. Maybe these are the same people who also have high buy it nows on Ebay. When I see a high BIN, I dont even make an offer figuring the seller would not be realistic based on the outrageous initial offer to sell.

[Archive]

Posted By: barrysloate

Bruce- if your assertion is true that prices in various auction houses can have as much as 200-300% swing, something sounds fishy. There is always a margin of error in any market, but that's too large a margin.

You can't have two houses that are exactly the same next door to each other and one is priced at 300K and the other at 700K. Your example, if accurate, suggests some market chicanery.

[Archive]

Posted By: Bobby Binder

Barry,

It is true that the prices realized in auction houses such as Goodwin and Memory Lane bring in much higher amounts in the 300%+ range even for cards that commonly sell on eBay. I am not so sure that something funny is happening in this case. I think there are some people that collect that do not use eBay and when a card they need for their registry is available they have bidding wars. They do not want to deal with the hassles of eBay and sellers they do not know. They are comfortable over paying and dealing with the same auction houses to build their sets or collections.

[Archive]

Posted By: Glen Turner

I have called and e-mailed Ebay many times asking them if they would put a box you could check that would allow you not to see BIN.
What do you all think of that?

[Archive]

Posted By: Ed Hans

"The hassles of eBay"? I can't imagine a much simpler or safer process, with PayPal protection and the feedback system. Compare that to some of the horror stories we hear (and those we do not) from auction houses. Ebay is certainly not perfect, but neither are the auction houses.

[Archive]

Posted By: barrysloate

Bobby- I'm not sure that ebay is that much of a hassle. If you had a choice of buying say a PSA 8 on ebay for $1000, or from a major auction house for $3000, I can guarantee you there are enough people out there who are willing to deal with the hassle. Like I said, something isn't connecting here.

[Archive]

Posted By: Eric Brehm

Glen -- I think if you do a Search in eBay, you can click tabs at the top of the search results page that will let you display Auction items only, or Buy It Now items only. Thus if you click the "Auctions" tab, the Buy It Now items won't be visible. Is that what you are asking?

[Archive]

Posted By: Jeff Lichtman

"It is true that the prices realized in auction houses such as Goodwin and Memory Lane bring in much higher amounts in the 300%+ range even for cards that commonly sell on eBay. I am not so sure that something funny is happening in this case."

Bobby, you're joking, right?

[Archive]

Posted By: Matt

Eric - I'm pretty sure that the "Auction" selection just eliminates store listings, but active listings with a fixed price/buy it now remain.

[Archive]

Posted By: Eric Brehm

Not to belabor this point, but okay, I'm convinced that a seller's investment in a card should generally be irrelevant as far as what I should be willing to pay for it. I should really only be concerned about whether the price is acceptable to me or not. There are two cases recently however where I did take the seller's potential profit into account:

(1) In this case, which I think I described previously, the seller bought a card for about $2600 and then immediately offered it for sale (BIN/Best Offer) with a $1000+ mark-up. He knew I needed the card for one of my sets and contacted me directly to see if I was interested. And I happened to know what he had paid for it. I was willing to pay a strong price for the card (it was a low pop card that is rarely offered), but I told him $1000 profit on an immediate turn-around didn't seem fair, so I offered $3000, which he accepted and closed the listing. Had I not known the history behind the card I might have offered more for it, closer to the listed BIN price, to make sure I won it. On the other hand, heck I don't know, maybe my sense of 'fairness' didn't really have much to do with it -- I was willing to pay $3000, and he was willing to sell it for that, so for us, on that day, that was 'market value'.

(2) I bought a large lot of high grade vintage cards from someone who was liquidating a portion of their collection. He offered the cards to me at the price he originally paid for each of them, with a premium added (i.e. profit for him) based on a fixed percentage of the original price. So the pricing for each card was not based on current market value, but rather on the seller getting a reasonable return on his investment. In some cases this meant I got a good deal on the card (if his original investment was low), and in others I probably paid above market, after his profit percentage was factored in. Generally, the cards had not appreciated significantly in value since the seller originally acquired them, so on average, I probably ended up paying more for the cards, to get them all in one fell swoop, than if I had been willing to wait patiently for each of them to turn up somewhere for sale in the future. Maybe I'm a fool for paying above market for anything (though as Bruce says that can be an elusive concept, especially for relatively scarce items), but the pricing scheme offered by the seller in this case seemed fair enough to me and I went for it.

I also did another deal, with a different seller, for another large lot of high grade cards, but in that case, the pricing was based on estimated FMV. I have no idea what the seller's original investment in any of the cards was. In this case I probably paid closer to FMV than I did in case (2) above, so in retrospect, this deal worked out better for me.

By the way, back on the main topic, I have had reasonable offers ignored by BIN sellers. They just let the offer expire without ever contacting me. I didn't think that was terribly rude, but it did sort of leave me hanging; I would rather in such situations that they decline my offer, so I can either consider making another offer, or just move on to something else.

[Archive]

Posted By: martindl

Jeff,
You said that the guy who is selling the card was the only bidder when he won it and that it was clear to you and everyone else that he paid 50% too much for it. You're now making him an offer for about what he won it for, which I assume is still 50% more than the card is worth. You didn't want the card the first go around and surely you don't want it still.

Sounds to me like your intent was to just aggravate the guy versus really buy the card but yet you want to complain that he's not being courteous?