I’ve never sold an item through Ebay and want to get some expert opinions. I recently had an interaction with a seller where they determined I “lowballed” them with my offer and got offended and cut off all communication. They were asking for $200 on an ungraded reverse foil Charizard from Legendary Collection that I believe would have gotten either a 6 or a 7, so I offered $145 hoping they would counter and we could settle around $155. I have two questions:
Does anyone believe my offer was offensively low given the ask price? I’m not asking if it was a fair offer because (assuming I’m right about the potential grade) I know it was near market value. I’m more asking if my offer was simply too low in relation to their ask since I offered less than 75% of what they wanted.
Are there any general etiquette rules for Ebay haggling? Should I pull a Pawn Stars and offer below my best price so I can haggle up to it, or should I be offering my actual best price right away as a sign of good faith?
I’m aware that there are obviously no “rules” around this, I’m just trying to get some sellers opinions so i can conduct myself in a way that is conducive to building relationships with sellers, as I intend to continue collecting for the rest of my life and dont want to burn any bridges because I was unknowingly acting like an ass.
don’t worry about it, your offer was not offensive, if anything you should be glad to not give money to such a seller. There are many assholes in the collecting hobby, both sellers and buyers, life is too short for trying to satisfy them.
I think offering 75% off what ever seller is asking is not lowballing. Seller can just sent counter offer or decline that offer. I think seller behaved stupid by doing that for you. If seller doesn’t want to deal with offers like that he/she shouldn’t add best offer option. I was selling 1st psa9 shadowless Charizard and got offers like 500€ that is lowballing…
Thank you all for your responses. It definitely sounds like I was not in the wrong. I had a feeling that was the case, but while I’m not new to the hobby, I am very new to Ebay and had no baseline to go off of.
eBay recently changed their default setting to turn on best offer when re-listing items, with a preset decline of 50% of the value of the offer. I know that I have had to go in and turn this off after receiving offers for 50% of an item’s value. That can get annoying, but it’s still no excuse for the seller to treat you like that.
As other people already stated; You’re not in the wrong.
So instead of you being afraid of burning your bridges, the seller actually did just that.
Don’t be surprised to see this behavior again, but I can also tell you from experience that a lot of sellers are willing to work with you on prices for a lot of items. As long as both parties act in a civil way, long-lasting business relations can be forged which are mutually beneficial. A good buyer and a good seller know this.
As long as the offer is close to market I appreciate the bidder. If they go way under market though I add them to my blocked bidders list so they can’t waste my time again.
Lowballers are just awful for the hobby. I’d rather give the seller a little over market than lowball them;)
I would disagree and say that business is personal. Look at it from the seller’s perspective. If you spend 100% of your working hours running a business selling cards, then the success of that business shapes your personal life.
It’s offensive to the seller to offer a low-ball price on something that is priced fairly and at the market price. Let’s say that a seller takes the time to determine what is a fair price for their product (market prices for similar products, a fair margin, inclusive of costs of doing business etc).
Let’s say for example’s sake that the fair market price of a product is $100. If a buyer offers $25 they are essentially saying a few things. First would be “I haven’t done my research to determine what the market price is” and/or “I know what the market price is but I’m trying to screw you by hoping you are either misinformed or desperate”. Neither of those are great scenarios because the seller is going to have to waste time attempting to inform someone who is unknowledgeable or trying to deceive them. In business, time = money and wasting time like that amounts to wasting money for the seller. Hence, that is why its offensive
I don’t fully understand why people get so hot and bothered by lowballing on Ebay. This is the purpose of autoreject, you literally don’t have to be notified by any offer you find unreasonable.
If someone directly messages you, that’s a different story.
Ebay’s autodecline used to be fickle and erase when revising listings. Now it is more consistent so you don’t have to worry as much about low ball offers.
I’d say half my listings are now auto reject and I’ll convert them all over eventually. It’s just too bad I have to. Many times people bid just a touch under my AR then message me that they want other higher value things too which would make a difference in my valuation for that one item that rejected a bid. My concern is, others may have given up on me after just one AR which potentially cost me a much bigger sale.
Hope that made sense lol.
Auto-rejects are pretty quick so hopefully the buyer would recognize they hit the AR and up their next offer. What I don’t get is a seller manually rejecting an initial offer hours after receiving it. If you don’t want to haggle then why accept offers? Always find that very bizarre. I usually offer around 75% of what’s listed to see how flexible the buyer is.
I don’t think any seller minds haggling as long as the starting point isn’t a ridiculous lowball. The kind of people who make those kinds of offers are bad for the hobby and aren’t worth a second of your time.
I saw a raw legendary reverse charizard well under 200 just a few days ago. Who cares what he thinks. He can either accept the offer or deny it. Either way its nothing to lose sleep over and definitely don’t bring “feelings” into it. Just keep sending out offers for what you’re willing to spend and every once in awhile you’ll probably get the deals you want.
