Haha thanks for the purchase!
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“Thank you for reaching out. I do not accept offers on any listings. Thank you for understanding.”
Most people are happy with seeing a reply. I’d keep this as a standard out of office message, but some people truly expect to sell at a fraction of their listed price (especially sports cards). I don’t want every communication getting pinged with that.
I’ve also countered with - What’s the most you’ll pay? and - Recent market explosion makes it difficult to discount any cards. Thank you for understanding.
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‘You can send me your offer via the ‘Make an Offer’ option and we can work from there’
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“Hello x is the lowest that I would be willing to go at this time. Thank you.” If you aren’t accepting offers, just say that you aren’t accepting offers. If you are getting so many messages a week that it is taking up too much of your time, then just don’t respond.
I feel like it takes more effort to come up with something clever to say than to just be honest.
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Pretty much the best way! 
Don’t want to come across rude and scare away a potential buyer, but this also let’s them know to go ahead and make an offer to start the negotiations!
There’s so much hostility in this thread.
I often send out 15% discounts to people who watch my items, so when I get a question like this I’ll usually respond with “10% below the asking price”, which tends to prompt them to try haggling with “would you accept 20% less?” and then I meet them in the middle.
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As a seller you get tired of everyone always looking for a deal. Either make an offer, buy at full asking price, or move on to someone else.
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Majority of the time I get this question on items that don’t have best offer option on. The majority of people that ask this question want 30% off. I have no issues selling any of my items and I’m not desperate for money. If they get their sensibilities hurt from my comments they can choose to buy from me or not, it doesn’t matter to me. I’ve mentioned the pareto principal before, and I know others on this forum have as well, if you don’t know it look it up. The, what’s the lowest you’ll take crowd, usually falls under the rule of who I don’t want to sell to (not always).
Edit: also what you described is what pisses me off even more. They ask you what’s the lowest you’ll go and then immediately ask for more off. Just goes to prove my point, they’re not who I want to deal with because they’re impossible to satisfy.
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I tend to reply with
"Thank you for your message and interest I have gotten a few messages about the item already and am in no rush to sell.
I could accept x (a price maybe 5% lower)
Or x if it was on a different platform ( to encourage a direct sale )
Unfortunately couldn’t do much better then that.
Thank you again for your message and please let me know if there is anything else I can do to help.
Have a great day"
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Did you make a typo with “presto principal”? I can’t seem to find anything which isn’t related to SQL databases.
The way I see it is that if you don’t want to respond to a potential buyer, just don’t reply. There’s no need to be sarcastic. Also remember that eBay only allows 3 offers if ‘Make an Offer’ is enabled - if 2 of those offers are below the item’s auto-decline it somewhat prompts the ‘What’s the cheapest you’ll sell for’ question anyway.
Auto corrected to the wrong thing, Pareto principal.
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I recently stopped using best offer for stuff I have a set price for, but people will just message me offers still. I usually just say the listed price, or if they want to buy multiple items we can work something out.
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But the thing is, most buyers who ask this question don’t ask it on items with the offer option enabled; they do it on flat BIN items.
I always use this analogy: do you go to Walmart and say, “Hey, what is the cheapest you will accept on this Elite Trainer Box?” No; you pay the floor price.
If a seller does not have the offer option on the item, no one should be asking, “What is the cheapest you’ll sell for?” If I were willing to go lower, I would have the “make offer” button there.
The only time I think this is ever acceptable is if you want to buy a large quantity of items. If someone is willing to buy X amount of items from me, I would be open to negotiating a price. Otherwise, pay the list price or go find a cheaper option.
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Most of my items are listed at buy it now. So I reply “thanks for your interest but I’m currently not accepting offers”
Bartering is pretty annoying in any context. It’s also not very autistic which seems odd to me considering the people in the hobby, but it’s the way it is.
If you’re worried about bartering with buyers, list the product as buy now. If you decide to keep best offers open and want to maximize your selling price, never bid against yourself. By placing a price on the product, you have made your valuatuon of the card known. The prospective buyer has to make the first offer or you risk negotiating from a weaker position.
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Not to play devil’s advocate, but I have definitely seen multiple people on E4 say they’ve seen sellers that won’t have the “best offer” option available on their listings to encourage only interested buyers to contact them (given that is typically only higher end items).
As someone who has sold and bought in the past, I definitely think it’s the seller’s obligation to avoid being snarky with responses (as mentioned above) and reply with a simple “not sure, but open to offers” or “sorry, i’m not interested in taking offers atm.”
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I try to respond as kindly and honest as possible, most of the times i end up sealing deals this way.
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Just out of curiosity, what are the snarky comment that people are seeing?
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Personally, as primarily a buyer, I never ask “what’s the lowest you’ll sell for?” It’s a terrible way to start a conversation or negotiation and just starts things off on the wrong foot. The seller obviously wants to maximize their returns while the buyer wants to spend as little as possible. Plus, if you’re going to be in this hobby for a while, there really aren’t that many sellers out there. It’s important to keep good relations with people, it’s a pretty small circle all things considered.
I check last sold prices and try and offer around that or a little above it. Sometimes they accept, sometimes they don’t. Personally, I’ve had and prefer the autoreject Best Offers since I can submit my offers and increase it quickly if it gets rejected. I’ll reach my maximum that I’m willing to offer and if they accept, then great and if not, no hard feelings we’re just on different pages.
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