Lowballin' Offers on Ebay??

Normally I make fair offers but sometimes I run into coins that have ridiculous markup prices by the seller! So the question is, you ever make a truly lowball offer on a coin and how has that worked out for you? You get any bargains so far?

 

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Bargains? No.

Reasonably priced?

Yes.

I've gotten 60% of asking price.

Z

 

Yes I have gotten some lowball bargains. On offers and on auction wins. I just sold a coin the other day for 250 that I won for 105. Usually lowball offers get shot down automatically.

 

I have made lowball offers that were declined so quickly they had to be an automated response. Other offers were countered - some I've turned down and some resulted in further negotiation that either didn't pan out or did. So, you name the response and outcome and I've experienced it.

One thing I don't think you should ever consider: Don't ever think that's it's somehow wrong, unethical, immoral, insulting or fattening to make a lowball offer. You hear all kinds of talk from people pretending or actually upset about receiving a lowball offer but that's just bleating. All they have to do is say "No". The coin market is a bazaar and if there's one defining characteristic of a bazaar, it's bargaining.

And I also think the only "fair" price is the one struck by buyer and seller. But I understand that we humans use the word "fair" to mean all kinds of different things so a debate about what's a "fair" price is meaningless.

 

Yes, I've had the same thing happen as well, all of the above! As I grow older, I forget a lot of my lowball offers but I've made some but normally not on big ticket items over $100 at all, but that's about to change!

 

Sort of depends on whether or not you are talking about eBay. If you are, then my experience has been 50/50. When a post says "Make an Offer" the seller can set the lowest offer they will consider and all below that are automatically rejected. If they do ask for offers, it means they know the asking price is high but really want to unload the item.
Rather than put in an offer, I have contacted the seller directly, asking them what the best price is that they will accept and often get a much, much lower price. Sometimes I counter, but usually the price is below what the item is going for, so I purchase it.
So, it's a hit or miss situation. All you can do is ask. If they say no, move on.

 

If some fleaBayer lists a common Morgan for $900 and its only worth $75, and if I offer $100, is that low-balling or a generous offer?

fyi.... my $100 offer was declined.

 

All my reasonable offers on eBay have been refused.

On the other hand I've refused offers on my items.
But considering my selling % my selling prices must be fair.
In December I've sold 20 of 24 items listed.
Listed 4 items this morning; they all quickly sold and were in the mail this afternoon.

 

Most of the time when I make offers, they are 75%-list price, and usualy on an "overpriced" coin. I don't consider that "low-balling" i consider that fair market price usualy

 

Agreed, particularly on the "overpriced" part.

 

When I see someone listing an item at well over "price guide" (I look at PCGS and NGC price guides and research recent auction sales) I usually don't bother making an offer. Now if I see a nice coin with a price within reason, I'll make an offer that's fair with recent sales after doing my research. If the coin looks exceptional vs others that have sold I'll usually go as high as 95% of their asking price. The lowest I'll offer most of the time is 80%. Then again, it's based on recent sales elsewhere.

 

I generally list coins at what I consider 'full retail'. Just as in a shop or at a show, I will consider discounts in the 10% to 20% range. Maybe a bit more on old stock.

If the offer is less than 80%, I may counteroffer.

If the offer is less than 50%, I just might block the user for wasting my time (and have done so on occasion).

The problem is that there are a few unscrupulous eBay sellers who price coins at 10x or 20x retail, fishing for lowball offers. This has led some buyers to think that an offer of 10% is widely acceptable. It isn't.

I don't set minimum offers because even unacceptable offers indicate a level of interest.

 

It's not really a low ball offer if its in line with sale prices. One thing to remember is auction house prices have additional shipping and handling fees that can be significant and eBay shipping is almost always free.

That said there are a lot of buyers that will legitimately just spam insanely low offers and see if anyone will bite on them that has lead a lot of sellers to block people that make low offers. If the offer is going to be significantly lower a message to the seller with some reasoning generally has more success than some random offer would

 

I make offers all of the time that I consider a fair offer based on what I believe something is worth, especially worth to me, regardless of the asking price, some I win some I am rejected by the preloaded response. If someone list an item and state that they will accept "Best Offer" ang the time runs out on the listing, eBay should make them take the best offer that they received while the listing was live. or suspend the account.

 

I even make stupid offers on stupid op things. Like someone selling junk I'll send a melt offer lol. Just so they can see that in the auto declines lol. Sometimes stupid offers can lower morale...

 

I'd strongly suggest a better way to spend your time.

 

I agree. But I mark mine high because of the ridiculous offer. When I know what my coins will bring when most are bu are strong au. I had a guy come to me the other day my coins were on auction and not starting like maybe 9.99 on a morgan so this guy hi i was wondering if you wanted to sell those 5 morgan's that you have to right away i would be willing to give you 21 ea and you pay shipping and then you make me an in each of the coin so that i'm not paying any more than 21.00 and you pay shipping. Pissed, a little bit but I had been up for 3 days straight shhipping parcels and generally I don't have time for that nonsense same as if I have 10 watchers on a 50 dollar item and someone offers me 5. So do you know what that gets them is blocked - blocked from me and blocked from buying my items so it can work against you. I agree there are many that are over priced and i might be one of those some day but it's like this -this man comes in on my bu quarter i have at 11 bucks . Overpriced but too bad red book is 8-10 and I knew that but he comes in and says these are 8-10 value fyi. Well I have the information, I just asked him are you interested in buying this because if not there's no reason for you to go around commenting on my items or any other sellers items for that matter. I told i have regulars that know if they come in and say what kind of deal can you make me- we are going to get to the true value. I think the best that we all can do is just mind our own because there way I see it and item is only worth what someone is willing to pay and in the end none of this matters anyways. But each person has their own way of doing business. If I have a bicycle i want 50 bucks for to sell it then it's not gonna make any difference that someone tells me the book says it's only worth 20. well it's not worth 20 for me to sell it and i'm certainly not gonna let some lowballer come in and dictate the terms of the sale of my coins because I own them not him. Anyway this guy said he could buy bu morgan's for 21 everyday and it made no sense for him to pay more. He also said it made no sense for me to take less.t So I just told him to bring me a handful all day long and not cleaned and not polished but I didn't get any response on that hmmmmm

 

I just wonder what kind of satisfaction do you get from trying to lower someone's morale. When somebody like that comes around like that I was saying I think don't they have anything better to do because it's not my fault their personality sucks and they aren't selling anything to stay busy. But I don't think you're accomplishing anything by doing that because at the end of the day Im still going to be making my share and shipping a parcel.

ebay shipping is not free- the seller has chosen to pay it to make their listing more appealing to the buyer - therefore even less the seller gets. I had good money in my coin collection because me and my husband both liked high grade coins and paid for em. I guarantee you even if In price high by the time I pay fees, and shipping of I chose ., and money to promote the listing i'm still going to get dinged on the deal.

 

Well I just wanted to stop in and use you guys eyes on those coins. i'm going to turn it in , it's been a long few weeks and I still have a couple people wanting me to bundle up some things for them. Talking coins is always good - and a sparkling coin to look at always makes me Smile. You guys have a good night

 

I'd be curious to know what motivated you to point that out when my post literally pointed out hidden costs elsewhere. Nothing "free" is ever "free". eBay shipping almost always has a cost built into the price because the algorithm harms your listing if have a shipping charge.

So yes eBay shipping is almost always "free" and doesnt have the hidden costs you get elsewhere