Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1999/07/15

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Subject: [Leica] Prices on E-Bay
From: "Doug Richardson" <doug@meditor.demon.co.uk>
Date: Thu, 15 Jul 1999 12:09:26 -0000

Dave Yoder <leica@home.com> wrote:

>I recently bougth two seperate Leica items on ebay and I've noticed
something that's a bit of an
odd coincidence, and I wonder if anyone out there can explain why on
both occasions the bidding
was jacked up to exactly my highest bid. It didn't look like I had
much in the way of competitors
either.
>Am I missing something? Is there some trickery afoot?

Has anyone else had the same experience? I haven't used E-Bay yet, but
it seems a bit weird - I can see items whose sale date is days away
already gaining realistic bids, while other items a day from sale date
are ridiculously low - less than $50 for something which even in poor
condition would sell for $500. I can only assume that in cases where
there has been no serious interest - just a string of ridiculously low
bids - dealers will move in at the last minute with a series of more
realistic bids.

I used to attend computer auctions here in the UK and they seemed OK,
but I once attended an auction at  Christies in London a decade ago
for something which I knew had to be worth at least 500 pounds. The
price slowly rose to 120, which was absurdly low. Just as the hammer
was about to fall, I bid 150. Fifteen seconds later the price had
reached 720!

Regards,

Doug Richardson