I use Auction Stealer. Never lost. :D I use the free part.

Here is a link that might be useful: Auction Stealer

I use www.bidnapper.com Free trial for 15 days, then if you want to continue you can pay as you go, several different plans to chose from. I think the one I use is 7.99 a month, cancel at any time. I've never missed a bid using it...highest bid is a different story! :)
Happy bidding & good luck!

KAT

I sometimes use Auction Insights. It's free for 3 bids a week, and you can pay for a service that allow you more, and closer to the last second. This one has been fine for me. It places the bid within the last 10 - 20 seconds.

Here is a link that might be useful: Auction Insights

I just place a bid in the highest amount I'd be willing to pay. AND THEN I WALK AWAY AND WAIT.

If no one bids close to my $$ then I win it just 1 bid increment above the bid next lowest to mine. If somebody wins it then I walk away with the knowledge that I didn't get duped into a bidding war and end up paying more than I was willing to pay.

But, I can tell you that losing an auction and knowing that I'd have been willing to pay more than I bid is painful. I learned my lesson early on and now I bid my very top $$ amount and sit back and watch. If I do lose an auction, I have no regrets at all.

What Monablair said. You don't lose because someone bids after you, you lose because you didn't bid high enough. Figure out, before you bid, the highest amount you would be willing to pay. Then bid that amount. I've done this and if no one else bids, I get the item for the starting price. If other people bid, I get the item for one bid increment (the increment changes as the price goes up) more than the next highest bidder. I lose if I bid less than someone else.

If you "nibble" bid, bidding one increment more every time someone else bids, you can drive the price up. If you wait until as late in the auction as possible and bid your maximum amount, the only way you will lose is if someone else is willing to pay more than you are. If you think something is worth $25 max, you will lose to someone who thinks it is worth $26, no matter when the two of you bid.

MLou, you lost last time to someone like me. I have only bought about a dozen times, so I am not an expert, but I do not enter a bid at all until the very end. I wait until just a moment before the end of the bidding time and I place my bid at that time. I do not let anyone know I am interested before that time because I fear it will run up the price and also alert someone to my interest since the items I bid on sometimes only have one other bidder. I have always won that way, but then, I have been lucky in that I have always been available to place my bid at the last moment.

I sometimes snipe an auction but more often do as monablair and camlan and bid my max up front and let eBay's increment bidding system do the rest.

I think the most important thing to remember when buying on eBay is be sure to read the auction listing completely and ask any questions *before* bidding. Check out the Seller's feedback, not just the rating, also read the comments. A more thorough tool to check feedback is on toolhaus.org - both FB given and received.

I have bought several hundered things on ebay and also been auctioning for years and years and years....my whole house is auction! LOL!
no doubt about it....just bid your highest amount the first time...none of this wait and bid stuff for something you really want...Bid your top dollar with your first bid.
the hard part is figuring out that top dollar!!
Linda c

Ditto what Monablair said. That's what I do too. No bidding aids.

tina

Bidding early doesn't work for me. It drives the price up and if you're not there, someone can slip in at the end of the auction and outbid you by just a smidge. Bidding in the last seconds can lose the auction too, if you decide you would have bid a bit more and someone else is sniping -- 'cause there's no more time left to increment -- but it usually works. When you see someone without many auctions next to their name, they often will get into crazy bidding wars all along the way, fighting it out. When waiting, other bidders may not think anyone else is interested or would actually bid that high. Just put your high bid in at the last seconds and make it an odd amount in the dollars, and cents as well. For example, if you'd pay $50, put in $51.56. Know how fast your system is working and practice your timeframe before taking it too close, so you don't miss the auction entirely by a few seconds.

No bidding aids for me either. I've been buying & selling on eBay for years and have done well over a thousand transactions. I always watch things until the last 15 seconds of the auction and then bid my highest amount. I still get a thrill when I win with a snipe bid. :o)

Squirrel, you said, "someone can slip in at the end of the auction and outbid you by just a smidge."

An auction is always lost by just a smidge because the winning bid is only 1 bid increment higher than the 2nd place "loser". The 2nd place bidder never knows how much $$ the winner was actually bidding and willing to pay because the winner's higher amounts would only show if your next bid forced him to go another increment higher.

I don't buy or sell as much as I used to, but I am an eBay instructor. In researching bidding tactics, statistics have shown that bidding early and bidding your highest amount doesn't neccessarily lead to a bidding war. In fact, many bidders become discouraged and drop out of the competition when they place several bids only to see they still are not the top bidder

Another thing: If you are having difficulties in determining what your maximum bid should be, do some research. If you go to the "advanced search" feature, you can search for completed auctions. So, if you want to buy a purple widget with a crimper attachment, you can see what the winning bids have been on recent sales of purple widgets with crimper attachments. You can also check the price of a new widget. You can check to see if it is easy to buy a crimper attachment separately. If it is, then you can also bid on purple widgets without the crimper attachment.

As an example, I saw a lovely glass vitrine, or tabletop display case on Ebay. It had two shelves, beveled amber glass, gilt metal, a metal flower on top, and a pyramid shape. It was petite and gorgeous and the perfect thing for my living room and I had no idea what it was worth. And therefore no idea how much to bid.

Several different searches on Ebay showed me that nothing else like this was for sale on Ebay currently, and nothing had been for sale recently. I checked on-line for new or old vitrines. Most were large pieces of furniture, which I didn't want and don't have room for. The two new tabletop vitrines I could find were not nearly as nice and didn't have the same look as the one on Ebay and cost between $200 and $300.

All of this added up to the fact that if I really wanted that vitrine, I was going to have to be prepared to bid high, as alternatives really didn't exist. I bid right at the final minute (I'm too much of a coward to snipe with mere seconds left in the auction) for $175, the highest I have ever bid by a long shot. I won the vitrine for $161 and some change.

It was all strategy. I knew I couldn't easily find a replacement and I had a rough idea of what the vitrine was worth. There had been several other bids over the last 48 hours of the auction, so I knew other people were interested in it. And I really, really, really wanted that vitrine and no other.

I have to admit, I kept wondering if I was bidding too high, if the vitrine was worth the money, etc. But when it arrived and I unpacked it and put it on my coffee table, I knew it was perfect for the room and the look I would like to achieve. And therefore worth every penny. (Even though I probably shouldn't start the decorating plan with an accessory.) It's got the look and feel of what I would like the whole room to look like, so I can balance other choices with the vitrine. (Now I just have to decide what to put in it.)

Another time, I really liked a small chrome lamp with a glass shade. Well, someone else liked it more and outbid me. Less than a week later, there was a listing for the same, exact style of lamp, but with a glass shade that did not match the lamp in style. Think ruffled cranberry glass shade on sleek, Art Deco style lamp. I won that auction for less than half of the earlier one. Even though I had to buy a new shade, I ended up spending less on it in total. I think buyers were turned off by the inappropriate lamp shade and didn't bid.

I've lost plenty of other auctions because I simply didn't place as high a value on the item as other bidders. There's a type of china I like. I'm aware that when I bid on this china, I might be up against a serious collector, who will probably be willing to spend a lot more money than I am. But the china is something that would be nice to have, but not something that I really need or want, so I am willing to lose out on the auctions.

So, figure out how much you really want/need the item. Check to see if other, similar items are available new or used, on Ebay or off. Check how much similar items have gone for in the past. Then figure out how much you are willing to bid. Bid once, bid your highest bid and bid as late as you can in the auction. Then sit back and relax.

An auction is always lost by just a smidge because the winning bid is only 1 bid increment higher than the 2nd place "loser".

I knew someone was going to say that! : ) All I meant is the winner can be only one smidge ahead and you've lost. One has no idea how high they might have bid, but if you're not there to watch, you've lost your chance -- and they can beat your highest bid if they're interested. They may have come in late and only tried to outbid you by a bit more.

I prefer to bid high in the last seconds. If I see I've still lost, I may panic and add just a bit more hoping to get it.

I wanted to thank everyone for their help. I was afraid I might not use the auction assists correctly so I just waited it out and bid in the last minute. I did get my items and even snatched up some shams for my bedroom. I think I will try one of the bid assist programs on an item that I won't mind if I mess up on and lose. Mlou

OK, silly question. I'm watching an item w/an auction that will end tomorrow am, right in the middle of the rush to get the kids breakfasted and out the door to school. So there is no way I can wait to place a bid till the last seconds: I just can't be certain that I'd be able to get there in time.

In that case, what's the better strategy:
--just use Ebay's regular bidding system, and bid my highest bid now, knowing that other bidders may see my bid and get interested?
--use one of the sniping systems and hope I do it right? (how idiot-proof are these things?)

I tried one of those bidders once and it bombed. As I recall, it was because there were no purchases made on my eBay account. I had set up a new account because I wasn't comfortable providing all that access to my regular one. So, the way I remember it, I came home to find it hadn't even bid on the item. I thought there should have been some sort of verification done before the auction, rather than letting someone come home to find it couldn't even process the bid. Forget which site it was and I didn't try it again.

Walkin, if you place your highest bid now, the only way you will lose is if someone else decides to bid higher than you. So you could place your bid now and know that if you don't win the auction, it was because someone else was willing to pay more. This happens, even if you bid in the last 30 seconds of the auction.

The benefit to using a sniping service is that you don't give others a chance to see what your highest bid is. That way, you could win over someone who "nibble" bids, but doesn't know what their highest amount is.

Sniping has it problems, too. The ending time of the auction can be very inconvenient (I'm always debating staying up til midnight or getting some sleep.) You can forget all about the auction and lose out. And someone can still bid higher than you.

There are pros and cons each way. If you don't want to use a sniping service, could you place your bid as close to the end of the auction as you can? Say right after you get up and before the kids are running around?

I'm one of those people that wait until the last few seconds if possible to bid. Once in awhile I'll place a bid on something and walk away. If it's something I want then I do bid my max amt. I don't like to bid ahead for reasons mentioned above. Mainly because it can drive the price up. Depends what it is and depends how bad I want the item. There were only two times I can think of that I was REALLY upset when I didn't win. One was a really neat old silver leaf bracelet the other was a two carot, diamond right hand ring. Still wish I would've big higher on the ring. The last couple of seconds me and someone else were bidding like crazy. I do wonder what her max turned out to be. I don't even look at jewelry anymore on there because I find too much stuff I like.

Ebay it such a thrill. Then when it shows up in the mail it's like my birthday or something.

well, I went ahead and bid the usual way, and will wake up early in the am to see how it goes! Thanks for the advice, all.

...and lost it -- in the last hour of bidding, the price jumped $20 higher than I'd placed my maximum. I checked past bids and realized I'd been pretty seriously lowballing. But this item comes around a lot, and various listings currently will end on Thanksgiving... so I'm going to snipe this time, and hope people get busy with their turkey and I get lucky.

THanks, everyone!

I always use auction stealer. I place my highest bid there then forget about it.