How to Get a Good Deal on eBay

The popularity of eBay has made it harder and harder to find bargains^{[1]XResearch source}. But it’s not impossible. By taking advantage of seller mistakes and using a little eBay savvy, you can come away with a great deal. Use these steps to find bargains, make sure you are paying a low price, and win the bid.

Part 1

Part 1 of 3:

Knowing How Much to Pay

Search online, call or go in person to local retail stores to see how much the item you want is selling for. Use the lowest retail price you can find as a starting point in your search. This is the price you’ll want to beat on eBay.
Once you know the local retail price, do a search online to see if it is being offered for less. Amazon is a good place to start. There are also search aggregators that will search many stores at once. And don’t forget to try Craigslist. Prices there are sometimes cheaper than eBay, and you can save on shipping by picking up the item.
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Now that you know how much the item costs outside of eBay, it is time to see how much it has been selling for on the site. Do a search and under options, click on “completed listings.” This will show you all the items sold in the past 90 days. Look at the final bids and compare them with retail and online prices to see if eBay is the best option. If so, use these bidding figures as a reference for how much you are willing to bid.^{[2]XResearch source}
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Part 2

Part 2 of 3:

Finding Good Deals

eBay sells both new and used items. You can save a lot buy opting for used, but be careful when buying very expensive items, as they will not have a warranty.
Particularly for large items, postage can add a lot to the final price, so it may make more sense to buy the item locally via craigslist or a retailer. When you search, sort items by ‘Price + P&P: lowest first’, to show the cheapest items with postage included.^{[3]XResearch source} Always double check postage before bidding.
eBay automatically search titles only. If you’re not finding the items you want, try clicking “include description” in the advanced search in order to search the description as well.^{[4]XResearch source}
If at first you don’t find the item you want, or find it but not at the price you want, then you can follow your search so that eBay will then alert you when the item you are looking for is for sale.
Because these items are only available to those in a restricted area, they usually get fewer bids. That means less bidding up of the price. You can find lists of pick-up only items on sites like BayCrazy^{[5]XResearch source}
Click “worldwide” for location in advanced search or in the left-hand bar after your search. Clothes and gadgets, in particular, are often cheaper overseas.^{[6]XResearch source}
7
Try misspelling the name of the item you are looking for. The key to getting good deals on eBay is finding items that are getting few or no bids, because the more bids, the higher the price. One great way to do this is to look for misspelled entries (i.e. “dimond necklace” instead of “diamond necklace”), because if no one can find the item, no one can bid on it.^{[7]XResearch source}.
- Try using a site with a spelling mistake spotter, like Fatfingers, BayCrazy, Goofbid or Bargain Checker.
These overlooked items usually go for much less than ones that receive heavy bidding. You can search for them on BayCrazy or LastMinute Auction.^{[8]XResearch source}
Although buying from an experienced seller with a high rating offers more security, you can often find better deals buying from new sellers who don’t know the value of what they are selling. Look for sellers with low but positive feedback. This is a great way to find cheap “buy it now” items.^{[9]XResearch source}
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Part 3

Part 3 of 3:

Getting the Best Deal Possible

eBay has changed the way it functions so that the bid you place on an item is now the maximum you are willing to pay, while the bid that shows up on the site is only an incremental increase on the most recent bid, until your maximum is reached. This means you may pay less than your maximum bid. People tend to bid round numbers, so to ensure your maximum bid has the best chance of winning, enter something like $20.01 instead of $20. This means if someone else enters $20, you will still win the bid.^{[10]XResearch source}
2
Use a best offer history tool to help you take advantage of best offer items. Some sellers will allow you to make a best offer, which they will decide whether or not to take.^{[11]XResearch source}
- On eBay, do an advanced search and click “accepts best offer”.
- Once you’ve found an auction that accepts offers, enter the seller’s username in the best offer tool at Goofbid.^{[12]XResearch source} It will show you the items the seller has accepted best offers for, including the average reduction.
- Use this information to determine the price to offer. For instance, if they typically accept 25% below the list price, you’ll know that knocking 25% off the price of your item will have the best chance of being accepted while saving you the most possible.
3
Bid at the right time. The fewer bidders there are in the last minutes of an auction, the lower the price will be and the greater chance you will have of winning the auction. You can therefore save money by bidding on auctions that end when there are the fewest people online.^{[13]XResearch source}
- Look for auctions that end after midnight on weekdays. Friday nights – when the fewest people are online – are the best time to bid. Sunday evenings from 6pm EST to 11:30pm EST are the worst.^{[14]XResearch source}
- Try using BayCrazy to find auctions that close late at night.^{[15]XResearch source}
There is no point in bidding on an item early on: this will only drive up the price. To maximize your chance of winning the bid at the lowest price, place your bid as late as possible, preferably in the final seconds before the auction ends. You can do this manually or using a sniping tool.^{[16]XResearch source}
5
Use a sniping tool. These tools will automatically enter a bid at a price you select in the last seconds of an auction. They take away the stress of doing the bidding yourself, and you can use them to bid on items that close late at night, when you are asleep. There are two drawbacks: 1) they usually cost money; and 2) they sometimes require giving them your eBay password, which is a security concern. If you do give away your password, make sure it is different from all of you other accounts (email, bank, etc.).^{[17]XResearch source} Here are a few of the more popular sniping tools:^{[18]XResearch source}
- Goofbid^{[19]XResearch source} – Free with registration.
- Sniper^{[20]XResearch source} – After a free trial, it charges 1% of the winning auction price (min. fee $0.25, max of $9.95).
- JBidwatcher ^{[21]XResearch source} – Free. Available for Windows, Mac and Linux.
- eSnipe^{[22]XResearch source} – Charges 1% of the winning auction price (min. fee $0.25, max $10.00).
- AuctionStealer^{[23]XResearch source} or AuctionBlitz^{[24]XResearch source} – Offers both a free service, and priority service with a higher success rate. Monthly subscription plans start at $8.99. One-time monthly plans start at $11.99.
- Bidnapper^{[25]XResearch source} – A 15-day free trial, then subscriptions from $7.99 monthly to $49.99 yearly. You can also prepay for snipes: 10 for $19.99 or 25 for $36.99.
- Gixen^{[26]XResearch source} – Free with ads, or $6 for an ad-free service with a higher success rate.
6
Try sniping manually. If you don’t want to use a sniping service because of cost concerns, security worries, or because you think you can do it better yourself, then you can snipe manually.^{[27]XResearch source}
- Start by adding the item you want to you “watch list” so that eBay will let you know when the auction is about to end.
- With 5-10 minutes left in the auction, open the auction page in two browser windows. In one browser, enter the price you are willing to pay and click “place bid”. There will be a confirm page. Do not confirm yet.
- In the other browser window, hit refresh to keep track of the time remaining in the auction. Continue refreshing until there is 1 minute left.
- Use a clock to count down 40 seconds from when there is 1 minute left, and then in the other browser window, click to confirm your bid. If you do it right, you can snipe the bid from unsuspecting buyers, but be warned: it’s very difficult to outbid automated sniper programs, which usually bid in the last 10 seconds or less.
7
Try good old fashioned haggling. This works especially well with “buy it now” listings or auctions with a high start price and no bids. Click “ask a question” to contact the seller, and then make him or her an offer.^{[28]XResearch source}
- Be polite and professional if you want to succeed.
- “I’d love to buy [the item]. I see it has no bids. Would you consider a lower price than the listing? Say $x?” will work better than an abrupt. “Will you take $x for it?”
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Warnings

Use PayPal to protect yourself in the event of a counterfeit or if the seller does not send the item.^{[29]XResearch source}
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Watch out for fakes. Some of the most commonly faked goods include GHD hair stylers, Mulberry handbags, Game Boy Advances, Ray-Ban sunglasses, branded golf clubs, celebrity autographs, Ugg boots and Montblanc pens. In general, the less professional the photo, the better. Scammers often lift photos from the brand’s site.^{[30]XResearch source}
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