Buying in the 21st Century


[Follow Ups] [Post Followup] [Dodge Power Wagon Forum]


Posted by Paul Cook in Kempner, Texas on Monday, August 28, 2006 at 5:22PM :

In Reply to: Description of 1950 Dodge Power Wagon For Sale posted by Dave Horvath on Sunday, August 27, 2006 at 8:36PM :

Things have changed. It has become a common practice for many things to have the initial asking price bid up over the asking price by buyers. Clearly, this is not true for a loaf of bread, but it is true for many high end items. It is the nature of selling and buying items that are subject to appreciation. This especially includes real estate and collector vehicles.

Dave is an honorable man. He is dealing with issues other than selling this truck. As I understand his comment, he has had a number of people offering to buy the truck. We all know from experience that many people offer to buy but cannot lay the money on the table. I do not believe he accepted payment and then backed out of any deals.

Selling on e-bay gives no assurance that the proper buyer ends up with the item. Several years ago, I sat up into the early morning hours to watch the end of an e-bay auction of a vehicle I was interested in. The seller openly lamented on this Forum that he failed to set a reserve price and it appeared that the vehicle would end up with a high bid way below what the seller would have set as the reserve.

This item sold to a bidder who had increased the bid several times in the final hour with no one bidding against him. This might have been done by a sincere bidder who was firing in the bids to circumvent the automatic bidding mechanism, however it was obvious that the automatic bidding had stopped.

The way this bidding progressed also suggested that the active bidder might be a "shill" a person who acts on behalf of the seller or auctioneer and makes increasing bids to force the final bid up.

Another thing that a "shill" can accomplish is that the "shill" ends up buying the item for the seller, so the seller can put this item back into the auction at a later time and perhaps start with a higher initial bid or put in a reserve. The seller would be out his auction fees but would make up that amount by adding it into an initial bid or setting the reserve.

Imagine my "No Surprise" when that vehicle showed up again on e-bay several weeks later with a reserve and an explanation that the high bidder could not pay.



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