most things second hand and in ok condition and order, well described and with their listings ending in the evening, will for 80% of the time … go for 80% of average new retail price. sometimes more than new has been seen.

Theyre are a relatively low numbers of private sellers left on ebay, due to ebay trying to force out low value items, by making it too expensive too list them on ebay, so they can furnish the shareholder with better profits, which means its ethos have moved away from the private second hand seller, ebay would love to push ebay into being a market portal for commercial retailers, and the proportion of commercial sellers to private sellers is increasing all the while, recently out of a page of 16 sellers for one type of item, only one was a private 2nd hand seller. Meaning bargains are sadly not likely to be had in items with any demand/popularity or function left in them. Also there is a deeply worrying trend for ebay to default to making all auctions private meaning researching the item or previous bids your purchasing from the seller before purchase is now almost impossible, even to determine if people had trouble with the item your buying from the seller, this is big mistake in the ebay system as it now damages the feedback system, do not give feedback to a seller until you are satisfied with an item regardless of pressure imposed by sellers to give 5 star reviews before you’ve even received the item ?

The only way to get a bargain is :

• to find items ending at odd times
• errors in the naming or the description
• poor listings that might put some buyers off
• items so specialised in quality that most people don’t know how good they are
• always bid your maximum amount at the very last moment ie dont show your hand early. sniping tools are good a making this happen automatically for you, though they don’t guarantee bargains.
• bid on lots and lots of items stick to a max bid under new price your aiming to get and wait until lady luck falls on you.
• be prepared to make a max bid for a good item that is at least 75% of retail for 2nd hand items most often under and you will lose.

and if you not countering in your time to save the equivalent very often of 30% then your not being honest with yourself most often spending an hours shaving £10.00 of a price isn’t worth it, regardless of how much the bargain hunter blood is in you ?

or of course you could accept the idea that the new definition of 2nd hand bargain is now 80% or more of retail ?

technology for instance is a hard area to get a bargain, unless your purchasing direct from a chinese e-seller and in in that scenario you have to be careful, to make sure that the quality of the item is export quality.

easier categories to get a bargain include 2nd hand clothing and shoes for instance, although clothing is one of the most variable in terms of what the item is actually like when it turns up.

The problem is in the past you might be able to get a second hand item for 50% of the new street price etc, ebay is now pushing that up to 90% regardless of the age or use of the item.

if you know of a new ebay equivalent with very low or no listing fees and cheap payment fees .comment it below