Large Scale Central

The days of deals on eBay seem to be gone

General Discussion
#1

I guess if you own a train store, the most profitable way to sell on the Internet is eBay. I’ve been watching two particular items being sold by San-Val under their eBay persona Anna.Kramer - a pair of Aristo Wide Switches and a Signal Bridge. Both of these items have now bid up to numbers that are higher than they can be found at popular retailers who list prices on the net.

I just find it odd that people would have a bidding war to get easily available items and pay more than they could have paid retail. No wonder eBay is so popular with sellers. Dere’s a sukah born evry minit :slight_smile:

JR

#2

Oh, yeah.

Been watching the evilbay auction-fever for quite some time.

There was someone asking about old Bachmann H0 sets on the Bachmann site a while ago.

They put it on evilbay, and I can’t remember, but I think this old set went for $130 or so.

Worth about $5-$10

TOC

#3

Stay right here, these are the good old days…

The first auction of homes in FT. Lauderdale recently ginned the same results as many an Ebay auction, the price of many of the winning homes were higher than market or asking price! There is a pyschology thing going on there. I personally think some people like to see their Ebay name listed as high bidder for 5 days. I prefer to find something I like, watch it till close, put my best price in seconds before the auction ends and I’m never disappointed in myself for bidding too much. If somebody else wins it, that’s cool, I was only in the “game” for a second, with no time to get caught up in an auction price war competition to win at all cost.

I just got five years of GR mag, plus an LGB catalog for $49 on the bay, and if I had tried to save these mags, they would be dog ear’ed crumpled and falling apart. Instead I got five years of mint mags! a great ebay deal.

An Aristocraft HW diner car Al just sold LNIB for $66.03, try adding a $100 dollar bill to that to buy one from the dealer new. 'Nother one sold for $81.90. My only gripe is that Al’s auctions close during normal business hours for east coasters, i’ve lost a few simply because I was called into a meeting while the auction ended.

I agree with you that he often gets more on Ebay than he even asks for the product from the San-Val website. So check his website and call for the unpublished Saturday-only deals first before bidding on mainstream items. But getting a used St. Charles Station Metal FP40H in warbonnet colors from him on Ebay for less than $500 keeps me coming back to his Ebay advertisements.

Honestly, I don’t know how the local trainstores in my area are surviving, unless they are doing ebay. You walk in to a brick and mortar, blow the dust off the boxes, and the best you can hope for is list minus ten, and then have to pay sales tax. Even Hans at Gold Coast is a BIG ebay dealer! It’s where the world shops.

#4

I agree. I used to be able to grab various deals on things (Got about 500 feet of brass code250 rail about 3 years ago for $100), but those days are pretty much long gone. I did get a pair of Indys a while ago for cheap, though.

#5

My strategy: enter the auction late and have a pre-set limit, then let the auction proceed and let yourself be surprised.
Works about 40% of the time, but I don’t use eBay all that often.

#6

Ebay has definetly changed over the last few years. It is much harder to find deals, part of this is a deminishing number of private party sellers and a dramatic increase in ebay "store’ which post their wares often beginning at or very near retail price!

Its pure BS as you can get the same thing often for less by shopping around on-line. To me if these ebay stores are allowed to take an ever larger share of the postings, its going to kill ebay as a place to find details and eventually it will just be another online shopping website.

That being said I have gotten a few deals still on ebay, most all of it non-trains, DVDs like “Futurama Vol 1” for $10, “The Train” for $6 stuff like that, I got an older Kalamazoo Drovers type caboose for $35, but I also have seen stuff going for loony prices too. I was bidding on an older large scale Battery Opted train set and stopped bidding at $40, even then I realized I should have stopped closer to $30.

The LGB burn unit victim currently being offered starting at $1500 is the best example of whats killing ebay, just plain greedy sellers. If they dont get you on the starting bid BE SURE to check the shipping, some of these guys make up their profit margin on excessive shipping. Seen: New Blight freight car, starting bid? $5, preset shipping cost $20!!! Now I know these could be shipped for as little as $5-7 if you can wait a few weeks for the USPS to send it via express muletrain, so where is the extra $13-15 going? Right into the sellers hip pocket…“handling fees” I beleive they call it…

#7

I have used eBay since 1997 and have done fairly well buying and selling. There is a little down trend right now and that just might be people are vacationing and not railroading. There is the extra cost of petrol that is digging in to the economy.

I believe in buying high and selling low but make it up in volume !!!

Anyone interested in a LGB #50 D&RGW diesel cheep ?

Cheers,

#8

YUP. And then there is this one: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=250013947053 $167 (with 5 hours left) for a used 27 MHz Trackside TE plus an Ultima supply.

I was really hoping that this wouldn’t go this high 'cause I’d really like to have another T/E, but anything over $150 is too high for for new, let alone used. I guess if you’ve just got to have one - they are currently unavailable and might even be gone forever.

JR

#9

Goodness! Last year at this time, I couldn’t get anybody to bid above wholesale price for nothing!

#10

Hmmm.
That’s with the Ultima, and a track-control unit to boot.

#11
Darryl Noble said:
I have used eBay since 1997 and have done fairly well buying and selling. There is a little down trend right now and that just might be people are vacationing and not railroading. There is the extra cost of petrol that is digging in to the economy.

I believe in buying high and selling low but make it up in volume !!!

Anyone interested in a LGB #50 D&RGW diesel cheep ?

Cheers,


How “cheap” is cheap, Daryl, remember yer talking to descendant of frugal Scots here

#12
Curmudgeon said:
Hmmm. That's with the Ultima, and a track-control unit to boot.
Don't be tempted. Street price new is $187 :O The seller is a consignment store so no telling what "great condition" is. The ad does not say that it works.

Jon

#13

Just commenting.

Trust me, there is no temptation…

#14
Curmudgeon said:
Just commenting.

Trust me, there is no temptation…


I kinda figure that. I thought about it again for about 5 minutes , but let it go.

#15

I buy alot less then I used too. One of the last good deals I got was an LGB track cleaning Loco for $ 320 plus $29 for shipping. And it had never been used from what I could tell, the power swicth was’nt on. I did hear Ebay is starting to crackdown on the excessive shipping charging though, that should help some. I have confronted several sellers about excessive charges and gotten some reduced. The problem is some sites us drop shipping.

#16

Yeah,

We had a guy who used to be in our club that was an evil bay fanatic, more than once he over bid something only to find out it was crap to start with. I quit fixing a lot of the junk he bought, it kind of slowed him down a bit. More than once for the price he paid for it and the parts it took to fix it, he could have had a new one. He would come over here and tell me look what I won. My question was “Oh it was a contest?”

He also had this quirk that he would start a bidding war and then drop at as soon as the other guy overbid. He would get stuck from time to time but he just thought that it was a hoot. He never had any intention of buying the item in the first place.

Later,

Ron

#17

OK I just made a few killings on Ebay…

DVD Metropolis -Fritz Lang, the rare '84 Giorgio Moroder version

a hard to find Black Flag CD

and…

a Bachmann G scale trolley…dont know condition yet but I was going to make a passenger car out of it anyway

#18

Interesting discussion guys. My experience and comments are about the same. I actually sold very successfully a lot of my O scale stuff so I could buy G scale. In the past I got some killer deals on ebay, but for my interests they seem to be getting more rare all the time. Most everything I am watching now I can buy from St Aubins cheaper. I have also bought some old GR magazines at reasonable prices. I think that the two important rules to buying on ebay is first know what you can get the same thing for elsewhere, and be very sure of the reliability of the seller.
Paul

#19

The experience related in this thread seems to show that there are still some deals to be had on used items, but finding deals on new-in-box is getting tougher. Most everything I’ve seen San-Val list has started very reasonably and then a bidding war drives the price up close to MSRP. I guess the guys who bid on this stuff don’t realize that most retailers discount from that price.

I’ve also had good luck selling. I unloaded all of my HO stuff 2 years ago when I was between jobs. It was well used 70’s vintage stuff and every engine and most cars sold for more than I paid for it new. I’m hoping to have the same luck as we try to liquidate the last of my mother-in-laws estate on eBay.

I still don’t believe that used Ultima/TE combo sold for close to new price. Only 'cause I wanted it, but didn’t want to pay that much.

JR

#20

I’ve been a long time eBay buyer and seller. The things that I’ve noticed in the last year are:

  1. The small sellers have left because the Ebay & Paypal fees have increased. The stores can write it off as business expense, but not the little guy. It comes straight out of his/her pocket.
  2. The buyers are thinning out also. It could be the economy or probably it’s most folks have all the common items that they want and are only looking for that one special item or items.

So, the bottomline is, if the little guy can’t get a decent price above the cost of the fees for his extra items, they leave and don’t come back. This leaves buyers with the dealer postings at retail prices.

That’s how me and the Mule see it on the Lonesome Prairie…Giddy Up, Mule!

The Lone Railroader