>Well I did not know there was such a thing as snipping.
>
>So what if two people are snipping the same item?
Two or three people can fire in bids at the last second.
I do manual sniping when I want an item.
Here is the procedure:
I do the first step, which is figure out what I am willing to pay for the item. This has to be done in a moment of rationality, so decide how much the widget is worth to you and stick to it.
Then I put the item on my watched items list. I do not put my maximum bid in as all that will do is provoke someone who thinks they want to win the auction more than I do to bid it up past my price. I keep the price low by not bidding on it. Ebay works into these inflated prices because two or more folks start bidding back and forth and get into a 'win at any cost' mentality.
When the auction is nearly closing, I set up two browser windows with my desired item.
One of them I preload with my personal highest price and get it down to the one click to confirm state. I do that a minute or so before the item closes.
Then I start refreshing the other window to do two things: Watch the price. If it goes over my limit, I just abandon the auction and tip my hat to the guy with more money. I also time the round trip so I know how long the internet is taking then to process a page refresh.
If the item has not gone over my personal limit then I wait to about 2-3 seconds longer than the round trip time (If the round trip time from click to refreshed page is, say 10 seconds, then I make my bid at 12 seconds) and simply click my prepared bid and wait and see what happens.
Either I win the bid or I don't have time to add a larger number and bid again.
If the former is the case, I pay what I was willing to pay. If not, then I don't end up going nuts trying to 'win' the bidding contest.
You can see how in the final minute of an auction all kinds of bidding breaks loose. Putting in a large bid really early and expecting eBay's proxy to do the job for you will usually just make sure your bid is the floor for the final bidding. So that is self defeating.
If I REALLY want an item, I am willing to put a large number in my one and final bid and attempt to hammer the auction into submission and end up with the item. But even then, someone else with deeper pockets can come in and hammer me. If that is the case, so be it. Every once in a while I will press my button looking at a bid of, say $40, knowing I am willing to go to $80 and when the page comes back I find I have been out bid--the bid is $100 with two seconds left. You just have to learn to let that one go.
Getting sucked into back and forth bid raising will just drive the price out of sensibility.
With the advent of the auto snipers, I am competing against machinery that is faster than I am at figuring out when to get the last bid, but that does not really change the value of this strategy.
Pick your personal limit, load up a browser window and fire one shot just as the auction is ending and take what you get.
And if the auction ends when you are not able to be at the browser, put in a bid if you absolutely must, but don't expect to win.
All of that said, I am buying very little off of eBay these days. I was amazed when it first came out that all these old kits that I wanted when I was a kid were still available. So I progressively loaded up on kits and engines that would give me a great classic stunt career.
Now that I find how much time I don't have to build the things, I am realizing I now own enough stunt kits and engines for the remainder of my lifetime. I could make a full time job for several years building these kits and that will never happen as I'd never have a place to put them on the wall. My future building and flying career is complete.
So mostly I just watch.
Good luck, snipers.
Cy
