E Bay is it worth it?

[Guest]

Just a question to chuck in

I have been looking at e bay for a week or so for possible bargains but nothing seems to have cropped up, do you think its worth watching out or are so many people looking that the savings are minuscule.

The LRDG chevie went for £25 plus postage (Thxs for the nod on that one :-) which is a fair old bit as much as (Hopefully) the new ones are.

Lost out on the Verlindan SAS guys by 50p

Your thoughts

[spanner570]

Mornin' Dograt, I always have a scan on e.bay. Good bargains can be had but I find some people are greedy with their postage costs. I know they are trying to recoupe the fees but they can still be dear.

My trouble is, I put stuff on my watch list, forget and find out the item goes for buttons! e.g., a new 1/35 armour kit went yesterday for a third of the retail price and yes, you guessed it!!!!!

Cheers,

Ron

[Guest]

Well Hugh, like so many of these things, you get what you pay for I guess! The Chev started off quite high but granted it's an old kit but it's hard to find-I've not seen any other than this one & rare stuff gets a better price.

I've bought some bargains on there-recently I got a T-34 for £28 (inc postage) which arrived next day & saved me £14 on what online shops charge. If I'd bought it from the high street the saving would have been more like £20!

If I find something that I like, I find out the cheapest that I could get it from somewhere else, subtract say £5 & then that's my limit. I was bidding on some Dragon figures recently, I stopped at my limit but they ending up going for more than the brand-new price in a number of well-known online shops!

The key to Ebay success is look hard coz not all of the sellers describe the stuff as we might expect & that can lead to a bargain. Also don't buy what you really, really want coz you'll end up paying over the odds!

Patrick

[Gern]

Hi Dograt,

If you want bargains on ebay, you need to be prepared to spend lots of time looking. There are certainly bargains available - I got a 1/100 HMS Victory for about £70 which retails at about £120. But I also saw the same kit once go for £230! Annoyingly that was only a few weeks after I'd avertised one of mine for sale and got no bids at all! (Don't ask me how I ended up with two models of the Victory! It's embarrassing and I'd rather not have to own up how daft I was!).

I tend to do my ebay shopping in short intensive sessions. I'll spend a solid week or so looking and find maybe 80 - 100 kits worth bidding on. If I bid I watch every one right to the end of the bid and I normally consider myself lucky if I end up with half a dozen kits. And on many of those my savings are only around 10% - 20% less than I'd pay on some of the bargain web sites.

Financially it might be worth it, but how much modelling time am I losing while doing it?

Gern

PS I still have a spare Heller 1/100 Victory if anyone's interested.

[Guest]

"you need to be prepared to spend lots of time looking.

Unfortunately due to a health problem I have far to much time !!

I cant wait to get back to work !

Regards

[Gern]

Dograt!

Wanna swap? I'm currently doing 12 hour days with homework most evenings and weekends - I teach. I can get a couple of hours in the evenings if I miss out on my much needed beauty sleep. (And yes, I know others who get less time even than me!)

While I do sympathise with you 'cos of your illness, I'd love to have some of that free time you have spare for my hobby. Any chance you could sell me some cheap!? Lol.

Gern

[wonwinglo]

Yes there are plentyo of bargains on E-Bay but you need to know your market well,I buy lots of collectors items and have to say that if it had not been for E-Bay then I would have not located them,the thing you need to remember is that on E-Bay you are bidding against the world,yes literally ! all the auction rooms are now linked on their sale days so you need to do your homework,also you quite often find things that are mis-listed in the wrong section thus they do not reach the buyers that they were intended for and go cheaply.

The only problem with E-Bay these days is that it is sooooo...slowww as they need to invest heavily in new software,you do not get any notifications on sales these days as the system has been trimmed to the bone,it needs revamping and new management.

[yak face]

hi dograt, as the others have said you can get some bargains but you have to be careful you dont pay more than you could get it new. Ive had some great buys for a few quid ,the thing i think its most useful for is getting those out of production kits ,often some of the older kits dont get that much interest but they can still be great toolings, just look at some of the old monogram stuff. cheers tony

[Guest]

Dograt! Wanna swap? I'm currently doing 12 hour days with homework most evenings and weekends - I teach. I can get a couple of hours in the evenings if I miss out on my much needed beauty sleep. (And yes, I know others who get less time even than me!)

While I do sympathise with you 'cos of your illness, I'd love to have some of that free time you have spare for my hobby. Any chance you could sell me some cheap!? Lol.

Gern

Honest mate you wouldnt want it for all the time in the world, the only time it doesnt hurt is when i am asleep, and that takes some pretty heavy drugs, in the day its hard to concentrate through the haze of pain killers,

I am self employed so my son has left university to do all the physical work, all I do is take phone call and do the accounts,he is the only one keeping us going.

I havent stood up for more than 8 minutes in the last year and believe me thats no fun at all, but there is only one way and thats forward and up

I started on 30 seconds and have built it up and am aiming for 1 min gain a week. I will get there !

[Guest]

That sounds awful Hugh, so I take my hat off to you for keeping going & even for putting yourself through modelling-a frustrating experience sometimes! Good luck to you in your efforts to get back on your feet. Patrick

[Gern]

Honest mate you wouldnt want it for all the time in the world, the only time it doesnt hurt is when i am asleep, and that takes some pretty heavy drugs, in the day its hard to concentrate through the haze of pain killers, I am self employed so my son has left university to do all the physical work, all I do is take phone call and do the accounts,he is the only one keeping us going.

I havent stood up for more than 8 minutes in the last year and believe me thats no fun at all, but there is only one way and thats forward and up

I started on 30 seconds and have built it up and am aiming for 1 min gain a week. I will get there !

That sounds really bloody awful, so if you don't mind, I won't swap after all!

How on Earth you manage to cope I don't know, 'cos I'm sure I wouldn't be able to. You have my best wishes for your recovery. You sound like a fighter so I'm sure you'll get there.

Gern

[jspitza]

Its well worth the look but I only use it for OOP or collections like Barry stated. I paid $75.00 for the AMT Hindenburg but it was really hard to find.

[Guest]

:strong:Hi, just to add my tuppence worth,

Firstly, I wish Hugh a speedy recovery, I certainly would not want to swap places with you there.

As for e-bay - definitely worth it. As Barry (Wonwinglo) stated earlier, you need to know your market and what the average prices are elsewhere, that way you can plan for what you are looking for on e-bay and not go daft paying over the odds. Some items come up where the seller has no idea of it's true value - bargain time !!

I have certainly had some good bargains on there and have been more than happy with my purchases. Some items don't get listed in the right part of a category so if you do a search in the general heading for that particular category, you may just turn up trumps.

Another trick is try deliberately mis-spelling what you are looking for - you will be surprised at what you can find and often these ones get missed in searches and will have very few bids on them as a result - again, bargain time !!

Thankfully e-bay are now clamping down on unscrupulous sellers with ridiculous postage charges so hopefully this is now a thing of the past.

If you don't initially find what you are looking for - try again in a couple of days or so - I sometimes check every week for certain items and sure enough they do come up.

Happy hunting and good luck with the bidding !!

Regards........Mark

[Guest]

Thanks for the advice and the messages much appreciated

Regards

Hugh

[jspitza]

You bet!