Thinking about cancelling my Bust half auctions
rhedden
Posts: 6,626 ✭✭✭✭✭
I've been selling some Bust Halves periodically on ebay over the past few months, and I've generally done OK on closing prices, but the ones I listed this week are not faring so well. Instead of going, going, gone, they are dying, dying dead. The number of views I'm getting and the number of people watching are drastically reduced. Is there a major show going on that I'm not aware of, or something? Anyone else having this problem the past weeks? Has anyone else tried selling Bust halves or other early type on there recently?
I'm seriously thinking about cancelling the auctions and cutting my losses. When the coin is only bid at less than half of its value with one day or less to go, and there's only one person watching the auction, one can't expect much in the way of last second sniping. I don't feel like selling my Bust halves to dealers for half of Bid, then getting smacked with seller fees and Paypal fees on top of that. I guess the question is how many people will no longer want to bid in my auctions if I cancel them all?
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I have sworn off E-Bay and am much happier not having to deal with it any more
Stuart
Collect 18th & 19th Century US Type Coins, Silver Dollars, $20 Gold Double Eagles and World Crowns & Talers with High Eye Appeal
"Luck is what happens when Preparation meets Opportunity"
The coin market is losing steam on EBay. I think the end is near. What say anyone ?
Cameron Kiefer
I have even had a negative # of watchers...
It is an auction format. If you can't/won't sell for a realized price then you should place a reserve or an opening bid that meets your expected price.
Of course you also have the right to sell or not, so you certainly have the right to cancel your auctions. Doesn't provide much confidence to buyers in any future sales tho in my opinion.
The Mid-America show is this weekend (Fri-Sun). But I doubt that THAT is the reason.
What are the graades of your pieces? Give a Link to your auctions for those that are interested.
Jim
<< <i>Its summer! Everyone should realise the slowdown happens every year! Its not the end of the coin market.
Cameron Kiefer >>
As much as I hate to agree with Barney Fife, he's correct. Same thing happened last year. eBay rolled up the sidewalks once the sun started making regular appearances. Good time for buyers, bad time for sellers.
Russ, NCNE
A good time to pick off a deal
Paul
I always do that or at the very least have a minimum. I like starting at my bottom dollar better cuz I don't have to pay the reserve fees.
JMHO
Link to poor old rhedden's struggling bust half auctions
P.S., they are also on the BST forum, but they're on like page 3 or 4 of the board right now, and I don't want to TTT them to death.
<< <i>
<< <i>Its summer! Everyone should realise the slowdown happens every year! Its not the end of the coin market.
Cameron Kiefer >>
As much as I hate to agree with Barney Fife, he's correct. Same thing happened last year. eBay rolled up the sidewalks once the sun started making regular appearances. Good time for buyers, bad time for sellers.
Russ, NCNE >>
Listings appear to be dropping off dramatically as well, at least in the categories I frequent. The U.S. Errors category has been well under 1000 listings for over a month, last fall the average number of listings was nearly twice that. To make matters worse, most of the listings that are showing up are of the "RARE DOUBLE CRACKED SHOULDER WOUNDED DATE SUPER RARE LQQK!" variety.
Sean Reynolds
"Keep in mind that most of what passes as numismatic information is no more than tested opinion at best, and marketing blather at worst. However, I try to choose my words carefully, since I know that you guys are always watching." - Joe O'Connor
I have to say that I feel like what seanq said about error coins on ebay is becoming more widespread in all the categories. There is so much absolute crap on ebay these days that it seems like it's not even worth it to get on there and look for the good stuff. I used to bid on large cents every day or two. In fact, my icon image, which is a 1798 Reverse of 1796, came from ebay just last May. But lately I have been seeing only about 1-3 coins a month that interest me, in all categories combined! When I am watching items these days, it isn't because I want to buy them; it's because I just want to see if anyone pays the silly asking prices. The rest is complete garbage. I can't even tell you how sick I am of seeing "1809 large cent, decent F-12" or " Scarce 1809 Classic Head Large Cent, Fine/VF" and seeing yet another corroded, scratched net AG-3 ground recovery offered by the usual junk hawkers (you know who they are) with Buy It Now for $504.00. This ocean of complete numismatic garbage is making it hard to sell good coins because there are less bidders, and the ones who are trying to bid on there can't find your items in a sea of overgraded junk!
<< <i>Link to poor old rhedden's struggling bust half auctions >>
This is one way to increase sales. I know they asked for a link. Maybe should have just titled it "link" and not done the poor old ploy.
Cameron Kiefer
Anyway it's frustrating to me to have a seller cancel an auction on something I had bid on.
Some of these auctions seem to have all the snipers hit at the end, but you never know of course.
<< <i>Out of curiosity, how many people here are on vacation? All this talk of a slowdown due to people being on vacation, everybody I know is hard at work as usual. >>
Myself and 200 coin collectors each week are heading to Colorado Springs starting this Friday for the ANA Summer Seminar.
Cameron Kiefer