Re: [CR]was: The rise and fall of vintage bike collecting? Now: Ebay Reserve auction fees

(Example: Framebuilding:Norris Lockley)

Date: Mon, 26 Jul 2004 13:48:24 -0700 (PDT)
From: "halbike" <halbike@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: [CR]was: The rise and fall of vintage bike collecting? Now: Ebay Reserve auction fees
To: classicrendezvous@bikelist.org
In-Reply-To: <072320041936.17815.410168AA00000B1E0000459722007589429C0B020E049C0E0E030A089B@comcast.net>


I have been dealing obscure balloon items for over 15 years (I am not talking about commodity/common items)- if there is only one person who wants your item, the proxy auction format is terrible ie the bidder may bid $1000 but if the next person only has a passing interest and bids $100 you get 102.50 -a disaster.

I KNOW my product and set reserves at a price that is borne out by past sales and expirence. MANY times my reserve has been met and the bid of the next bidder is HUNDREDS lower- so knowing your product and how to price it is critical. HOWEVER if no one needs it today, you pay a big price for the reserve (possibly listig many time$ till that elusive buyer is needing your item) but at least you "live to play another day"

What a person may pay one day when they have no bike is very different than what they would pay the next, right after finding the bike missing the critcal part.

paul genaro
sidney ny


--- themaaslands@comcast.net wrote:


> It was stated:
> >Ebay has cranked the reserve fee throught the roof.
>
> > I can no longer offer my quality items there. If I
>
> > protect it with a reserve, the fees are too high<
>
> The reserve fees are fully reimbursable once the
> reserve is reached. So the only time that you ever
> really have to pay for a reserve price in an auction
> is when your item does not meet reserve. I can't
> think of a fairer way to handle things. If there was
> no reserve fee, everybody could readily list
> everyting with high reserves and then simply contact
> the high bidders after the auction and settle for a
> sale off ebay without any final transaction fees.
> Personally I like the reserve price so that I can
> make proper use of the 'buy it now' option. At a
> nickel a shot, the 'BIN' option is a relative deal.
> When I have an item that is reasonable rare, I tend
> to offer a BIN price that is just slightly over what
> I consider to be the 'perceived market' level price
> of the item. If somebody wants the part bad enought,
> they will generally cough up the small up-price to
> ensure they can get the part. The BIN option remains
> available only as long as there is not a definitive
> buyer of the item. So if you do not have a reserve,
> the BIN option disappears as soon as one offer has
> been made, whether it be of $0.01 or 99% of your BIN
> price.
>
> Generally speaking, if your item does not reach your
> reserve, it generally means that either your item
> has a very small group of interested parties and you
> may just have lucked out in posting in the time they
> were all away from their computers; or you have
> unwarranted price expectations for your product. The
> latter case seems to be much more common. In this
> case, putting a reserve price does indeed seem to be
> very expensive, as you are effectively paying to be
> taught a lesson on the lesser 'true' value of your
> item.
>
> --
> Steven Maasland
> Moorestown, NJ
>
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