Now I'm peeved!!

marinewife05

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I was bidding on an Armarkat cat tree on ebay...no bids and half an hour left. I bid a max of $5.00 US and waited. No other bids until the last 40 seconds and I got outbid by a new ebay member who had never purchased anything. So now I'm thinking maybe it was a scam...I mean what are the odds that I would have got sniped at the last second by someone who had never purchased anything??

Argg!!! I really wanted that cat tree!!!!
 

kailie

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Ugh, I'd be frustrated too.


I've been looking on the Armarkat website directly and am thinking of ordering one soon. The one I have now the kitties have pretty much destroyed.


I would hope it wasn't a scam, but I guess you never know. Better luck next time.
 

missymotus

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How frustrating.

I use a free sniping software to help win bids in the last few seconds. Doesn't win everytime but helps a lot.
 

natalie_ca

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Could be. But it's also possible that the person was one of those that watches an item until the very end before bidding so that they don't end up over bidding.
 

strange_wings

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If you don't have a lot of money to spend, sniping is usually the best way to do it. One of the times I bid early I ended up losing, so I always snipe items. And if I can't win with the snipe bid because the other person set their max high - at least I make them spend more than they intended. I'm sure I've made people angry that way - spending $50-100 more than they wanted.

It also keeps anyone who may be a bit competitive from getting into a bidding war. You may win the items on those, but you'll always spend more than you really wanted to and for something that is rarely worth spending that much for.

As suggested, use software to help you. Or set a high max bid, so if they outbid you at least they're spending more.
 

mrblanche

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I use Auction Sniper for anything where the bidding looks competitive.

Auction Sniper

We got the famous TCS motor home that way, and I was only $100 more than the next bidder. One trick is to bid an odd amount. For example, instead of bidding $5 on an item, make it $5.57.

Join Auction Sniper. The first few bids are free. Find one of the cat trees you want that has no bids on it, and bid as I suggested above. That way, the seller won't know to put in a shill bid, if that's what happened. If, in fact, you are once again beaten by a last minute bid by what looks like a shill, don't be afraid to report it to e-bay. After all, THEY have records to check on new members.
 

MoochNNoodles

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We've puchased 2 trees from them. both of them we put in a low bid, then at the last second upped our bid. Worked great for us. Hope you get one soon! We've been really pleased with our trees.
 

atinsley

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Actually Dusty most of the places on ebay offer free shipping or are still cheap enough to warrant buying it on ebay even with shipping.

My personal favorite is craigslist... you get a lot of cheap stuff that people just wanna get rid of quickly. I just got a floor-to-ceiling cat tree for 30 bucks. I use a craigslist searching program to notify me when certain items go up and I can usually get to it pretty quickly.
 

clairebear

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I don't think it's a scam. That's how most people bid on ebay. I buy and sell on ebay all the time. It can be kind of annoying, some people are great at waiting till the last second.
 
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marinewife05

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Yay!
I bid again today on the same model and won this time. I bid an odd amount, but no one ever bid on it this time. Now I can't wait to get it and put it together for my kitties!!!
 
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