Ebay guitar ‘traders’/flippers

kos5150

Yeah it was an Steve Vai Ibanez signature model. Had it online for a couple of months with no bites and then it sold just like that. The only difference between our descriptions was that he laid it on a bit thick, I didn't think it was in as good a condition as he did.

martinw

Skipped

I think most stuff I see on here (and saw on the MR forum) is advertised at realistic street price levels, and that is exactly what I would expect. This is a specialist forum. People have long memories and it is not unusual to see a guitar advertised for the same price that it changed hands for last time.
Isn't that how a community works?

I hope we don't lose that.

Dave_Mc

This is just my personal opinion (obviously).

It does seem a little off if someone buys it just to sell it for more. That's not to say I think it should be illegal or anything like that. But yeah- it's like you're not playing in the spirit of the game. Get a good deal if you're going to use it yourself, let someone else have the good deal if you're not.

If it's cheap enough where you figure you might as well take a punt, meaning to keep it if you like it but sell if you don't, that's different. But going in with the express intention of selling it whether you like it or not, solely because it's cheap... personally I don't like it and I wouldn't do it (though admittedly part of that is that I couldn't be bothered with the hassle, plus I wouldn't hold it against anyone if they desperately needed the money).

That's my philosophy, anyway.

Gru

I have had this happen a couple of times to me, but at the end of the day if you have sold at a price that you are happy with, as annoying as it is, maybe we should have taken a chance and listed it for more.

I am pretty sure the Pacific I sold will sell for more in the future, unless its been butchered. I didn't really pickup on the rarity of the combination. Ok I would only have got another £20-£30, but it all adds up. However, at the end of the day I was happy to get the same that I paid for it, I certainly can't say the same about the fret king :-(

fretfinder

Wolftone said:

I normally buy on Ebay and sell on Gumtree. The logic behind this is that many people don't have the courage/knowledge to buy blind and prefer to come and 'see' the guitar which is where my margin is. They can always walk away but on Ebay, it 'aint so easy.

My best so far was an '89 LP Std bought on Ebay for £1050 and sold via Gumtree for £1500.

So, are you one of these trader/flipper types then?   

mellowsun

Worth remembering that ebay fees are capped at £40 (or they were the last time I sold some high value items on there), although PayPal fees are always 3.5%.

Personally I'd rather sell a guitar face to face for cash for 5-10% less than the net ebay value than have the hassle and worry of posting it to an unknown ebay buyer.

ToneControl

mellowsun said:

Worth remembering that ebay fees are capped at £40 (or they were the last time I sold some high value items on there), although PayPal fees are always 3.5%.

Personally I'd rather sell a guitar face to face for cash for 5-10% less than the net ebay value than have the hassle and worry of posting it to an unknown ebay buyer.

£75 cap now, I think it was higher for a while. Fee on postage now too.

mellowsun

Ebay now charge on postage? Utter scumbags. In that case selling a PRS for 1000 cash on here vs 1400 on ebay minus ebay / paypal / postage fees might be worthwhile

GuitarMonkey

mellowsun said:

Ebay now charge on postage? Utter scumbags. In that case selling a PRS for 1000 cash on here vs 1400 on ebay minus ebay / paypal / postage fees might be worthwhile

Plus, in some categories they cap the postage so you can't even charge what it costs for a tracked delivery.

crunchman

I really wish there was an alternative to Ebay - something like Ebay was 10 years ago when it was more about private sellers, and provided a service, rather than milked you for as much money as possible.

The cherry on top is that they've "based" their European operations in Luxembourg (as have Amazon) to profit from the low VAT rate - but somehow they pay their corporation tax in Germany where the rate is lower!

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/12/01/uk-ebay-tax-europe-idUKBRE8AT0S420121201

Dave_Mc

The other thing I'd say (in addition to what I said above) is that if enough people do the "I'll take a punt on buying it to sell on because it's so cheap I'm bound to make some profit on the deal" it makes it very hard for anyone else to actually get a good deal. Ebay has been like that, at least to some extent, for a while now- if something is going for a song, someone normally bids it up towards the end. There seem to be fewer good deals than there used to be.

Again, I'm not saying I think it should be illegal or anything like that, but it's annoying. )

kos5150

Dave_Mc said:

The other thing I'd say (in addition to what I said above) is that if enough people do the "I'll take a punt on buying it to sell on because it's so cheap I'm bound to make some profit on the deal" it makes it very hard for anyone else to actually get a good deal. Ebay has been like that, at least to some extent, for a while now- if something is going for a song, someone normally bids it up towards the end. There seem to be fewer good deals than there used to be.

Again, I'm not saying I think it should be illegal or anything like that, but it's annoying. )

True that, it's like that strat in the original post. At £300 I (or somebody else) would've of got a ton of use out of that, but now it's just going to sit under some guy's bed until someone willing to shell out £480 comes along, which I'm going to take a punt and say is likely to be some time considering what else you can get for that sort of money.

The more I think about it the more it just seems like a daft exercise these days unless you're going high-end. Let's work this out: £480 - £67.20 (eBay/PayPal's 14%) then minus the £30 for postage, which works out at £382.80. Of course before all that he's got to go and pick the thing up, which let's be generous and say costs £2.80. So that then leaves a £80 profit. Then, he has the worry of whether or not it arrives in one piece, which - now that couriers usually won't allow them to be insured - is a bit of a gamble. Then you have to hope that the buyer agrees with the description given and is happy with the guitar, otherwise you're down even more postage.

Is it just me or does that sound like an awful lot of a headache for little pay off? I'm a bit groggy today but I think I've worked that out correctly.

fretfinder

ToneControl said:

mellowsun said:

Worth remembering that ebay fees are capped at £40 (or they were the last time I sold some high value items on there), although PayPal fees are always 3.5%.

Personally I'd rather sell a guitar face to face for cash for 5-10% less than the net ebay value than have the hassle and worry of posting it to an unknown ebay buyer.

£75 cap now, I think it was higher for a while. Fee on postage now too.

Does this mean that if you sell a £2k guitar you only get charged £75 final value fee?

kos5150

fretfinder said:

Does this mean that if you sell a £2k guitar you only get charged £75 final value fee?

Yeah I believe so, I think it's been like that since about April or something.

fretfinder

kos5150 said:

fretfinder said:

Does this mean that if you sell a £2k guitar you only get charged £75 final value fee?

Yeah I believe so, I think it's been like that since about April or something.

Cool, I'll reduce the price of my R8 on ebay then!

kos5150

Not by too much though, you don't want any cheeky bastards to come and pull any 'flipping' shenanigans on you

jpfamps

People trading on eBay add liquidity to the market.

This is good for sellers as without dealers buying on eBay seller would get lower prices for their goods.

downbytheriver

Weird... my comment needs "approving"?

downbytheriver

Fusionista said:

TheGuitarWeasel said:

p90fool said:

I pay 20p in VAT every time I spend a pound, and spend around half my income on fuel and wine, which is taxed at what, 60%?

How and where I earn my money is my affair quite frankly, the cunts still get their cut.

Agreed to the bloody hilt!

Wisdom awarded.  I could give you stats on how much the UK govt takes in tax, but apathy has 

Can I just say that awarding a wisdom for maths this poor is wrong! You pay 20p in tax when you spend £1.20....