bojay1997
-
Content Count
1,099 -
Joined
-
Last visited
-
Days Won
2
Posts posted by bojay1997
-
-
Yes it is. The guy is winning everything this seller has that is sealed no matter the cost. Interesting.
Actually, the Qubes for $260 was from a different seller and the Tapper wasn't sealed. This buyer just seems to be spending whatever it takes to build their Colecovision collection. The bidder also spent over $130 on a sealed Keystone Kapers for Colecovision.
-
Definitely a battle...
Isn't this the same bidder who also won the $300+ Tapper and the sealed Qbert Qubes a few weeks back? They are apparently not exclusively into sealed, but they sure do pay crazy amounts for things.
-
Oh wow, this has been going a lot longer than I thought!
bojay1997 it sounds like you need to stick to Wal*Mart for your purchases. I've had stuff shipped back supposedly "not as described" when, in fact, it was described accurately with pictures of the game and something like "tested and working". You don't get much clearer than a photo.
The forklift comment wasn't a joke. I had a $500 musical instrument shipped via UPS (yes, via a reputable carrier) and then lost in transit. When they finally found it and got it to me, it had a hole in the box where it was punctured by a forklift. It's a stroke of luck they didn't hit the instrument itself because like our games, it's a vintage piece. Packaging is just common sense, although Guitar Center didn't exercise much of it when they packed that instrument. If you've sent a rare game out in a small box with a couple inches of bubble wrap or ghost farts in there to protect it, there is no reasonable way it's going to get damaged. If the carier decides to run over it with a truck, well, I don't care how much you paid, what they did is not my fault.
I have quit selling on ebay, mainly because the time spent listing and packing items is not worth the dwindling return I get on them. After ebay's ridiculous fees, I was getting $2 in profit per sale. It simply was not worth the time I spent working on each sale. I can sell an item locally through word of mouth or through the Retro Gamers' Society and not have to worry about packing or shipping. Sometimes I don't even have to create a listing--I meet with fellow gamers locally, they see what's available and a deal is struck. There is no middle man, no ebay fees, and no shipping to argue over. Often times the items are tested on the spot.
I understand ebay needs to charge something for selling on their site, just like the newspaper charges for a classified ad. However, the increased fees and the push towards power seller status or this or that other status just to get a reasonable rate on listing or shipping really puts a cramp in the profits of a newcomer. I had only three or four bad experiences in the last few years, but again, it's just not worth my time to spend an evening fixing stuff, then an evening listing stuff, then another evening packing stuff, just to make $2 per order or make a grand total of $20 in profit for the week. It's much easier to meet with fellow gamers in own and sell or trade the stuff off for something I want.
Finally, how does a buyer get his money back for return shipping? Simple: Small claims court. You put your own money up front to make a case against the big, bad, evil seller who is only trying to steal your money. If you're right, you get your shipping refunded and that big, bad, evil seller will have to pay your legal fees. If it's not worth going to court over and putting your own money up front, then just maybe it's not worth arguing over who pays to have the item shipped back. Or maybe your "not as described" claim is actually fraud as I was worried about this time last year.
I'm not aware of any state where you can recover attorney's fees in small claims court. You also would still need to collect the judgment and that's next to impossible for an individual to do, especially if the seller is out of state. In short, making sellers responsible for return shipping on not as described items is the only reasonable approach as sellers are fully in control of how items are packed, how they are shipped and how they are describing items. Buyers have little or no control over these things.
-
I don't feel like going though the whloe thing
If I see a item I want for cheap a small one, with high shipping, I just pass on it
Cool. Less competition for the rest of us.
-
Why are you charging close to $8 shipping for 1 box?
Should be cheaper
He's already explained this fully multiple times. How about taking a moment to read his post immediately above yours?
-
Absolutely, totally and completely false. Again, I do this kind of shipping FOR A LIVING and ship well over 125 packages a week. I have yet to have one item sent in a Priority Mail box damaged this year. Every one of the items I've sent out has been VERY well protected and has arrived safely. I'm not talking about 5-10 packages here...I'm talking about close to 4,000 packages this year alone with nearly 70% being both domestic and interational Priority Mail.
Peace,
Chip
I probably buy 30+ items a month that come shipped in priority mail boxes. I would say I receive 2-3 a week that arrive damaged when they are shipped in priority mail boxes and this is from sellers who actually care and provide adequate packaging. It's great that you've been lucky, but it also could be that your buyers don't bother to complain. There are a couple of hardcore comic collectors I work with that have shared similar experiences in recent months. In fact, most of the major comic collector vendors they work with use recycled Diamond boxes that are double ply to ship higher value items because they have had a massive increase in claims since the USPS went to thinner boxes. Maybe we all live in a bad postal area of Los Angeles, but I kind of doubt it. In any event, for high value items, I always ask the seller to use a real box and I pay whatever extra costs are required to do that. Given the value of these items, there is no way anyone should be skimping on shipping.
-
1
-
-
I sell collectibles on eBay for a living and am a Top-Rated Plus Gold Powerseller. I have sold hundreds of Atari items in the past but currently I sell mostly comic books, which weigh more than these boxes and are more prone to slight defects severely affecting value.
To ship a single comic book it costs me $3.99 (including packaging costs). You could ship several of your Atari boxes via Priority Mail, boxed and extremely well-protected for less than $6.50 to all parts of the USA. Priority packing supplies are free are are not only available at any post office but you can have them sent to you door for free.
I'm just trying to help you out here.
Peace,
Chip
The current priority mail boxes being given away for free by the USPS are of horrible quality. I regularly receive damaged items because they are almost completely unable to withstand any kind of bumping or weight. I certainly wouldn't ship comic books or other fragile paper collectibles in them as they will arrive bent. These boxes will similarly end up damaged unless they are properly packed and that means reinforced boxes with sufficient padding and rigid interior support.
-
People with deep pockets already own all this stuff, not a whole lot of new rich collectors joining the 2600 scene these days
lolIf you can list, sell, package, answer questions, ship and deal with complaints on over 600 items in just a "few" hours then please tell me your secret
Its only fun if you are a collector. If I found 600 precious moments figures in the trash and some old lady offered me 70% the value so she could deal with the bullshit they would be sold before I could unpack them, lolWhat if they were a bunch of Precious Moments figures that nobody was really sure what they were worth and that hadn't appeared in that pristine condition in many years? I mean, I could understand if this guy didn't want to spend the time and someone was willing to do the selling on a 30% consignment basis with 70% going to the seller, but otherwise it makes no sense to guess at the value and then deal with the strong possibility that your valuation was far too low. It's also not that tough to take photos and then follow a template on Ebay for listings.
Yes, it will likely take a number of hours to list them all (he did say he might group the Vic and TI stuff that he suspects probably correctly is less valuable) and to ship them all out. Having said that, I suspect many buyers are going to scoop up as many of them as possible, so I doubt he is going to be shipping out hundreds of packages. There are also plenty of deep pockets collectors who do not have these boxes. Look at how much interest was generated here among some very prominent collectors and that doesn't even account for the lurkers and people who have never been to this forum but who buy classic games for crazy amounts on Ebay. You must make a pretty good living if you can leave 30% of what will undoubtedly be thousands and thousands of dollars on the table. We should all be so lucky.
-
Quite honestly, for something you found in a dumpster and have no interest in collecting why bother trying to get top dollar? It only causes stress and headaches when peoples buyers remorse and overspending catch up with them so they take it out on the seller. In your shoes I would have just dumped them at say 70% of market value to a collector willing to deal with the BS of flipping the rest so he could get a few "good ones" for his personal collection. The stress that extra 30% brings you is only worth it if you are passionate about the hobby. Besides Ebay fees suck ass, just my 2 cents and it's an honest 2 cents as I am interested in nothing you are selling
Not sure I follow the logic. Ebay fees are only 10% (He would still have to pay the 3% Paypal regardless of if he sold them here or to a middle man). Why wouldn't you put in a few hours to make an extra 20% percent selling them yourself? How would he even set a market value when many of these boxes have not been sold in mint condition for many years, if ever? How would he know what 70% of market value is?
Frankly, I think some of these will go for hundreds of dollars each and 20% on even a few dozen that sell in that range is another $750-$1000 for not a lot of extra work. That doesn't even include the extra 20% on the remaining hundreds of boxes. Unless he has no time at all, it seems like doing the work himself would be well worth it.
I also don't buy this angry bidder backlash claim. On uncommon items like these, the bidders with deep pockets tend to come out in force and they aren't the type to complain about overspending.
-
But if you place your highest bid early, other bidders will chip away at it - so even if you do happen to win the item, you most probably will have paid a higher price for it than if you'd placed your maximum in the final seconds.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Unless you have obscure items (which can be hit and miss ebaying - due to limited interest), you are far more likely to get a higher price for them with a bidding war on ebay IMO.
That all depends on the other bidders and quite frankly, the item. I personally just use the Ebay smartphone app so I can bid from anywhere. I also personally tend to bid at the end (not sniping exactly, but late enough to avoid certain concerns like shill bidding). None of that changes the fact that if you bid the full amount that you're willing to pay, the only possible way someone else can beat you is if they bid more.
I agree with your second point. These are definitely not obscure items. They are items that have a high demand and will probably sell for record amounts.
-
When did it become fashionable to push the merits of eBay vs. encouraging trade in our very own marketplace?
And either your logic is flawed or you lack experience regarding the last second sniping thing. Happens all the time if you're not there to babysit your bid. Has nothing to do with lowballing at all.
Ever since buyers like yourself started to take an overly aggressive approach to trying to eliminate the competition for desirable items by trying to make sellers believe they will never get a better deal than what you're offering.
I have been buying on Ebay for 17 years. The only time sniping has any impact on me is if the sniper is willing to pay more for something than I am willing to bid. Sniping is not some magical trick or deceptive practice, it's simply a technique some bidders choose to use for a variety of reasons. If you don't want to be outbid by a sniper, all you have to do is bid the very highest you're willing to pay. If you still get outbid, the sniper wanted the item more and was willing to pay more. That's just how a competitive marketplace works.
-
3
-
-
Surprised it sold for on 10k.
It's non-working, not in the best shape and the seller did almost nothing to promote the auction. I think he could have gotten significantly more, but $10K is still a record since the last complete one sold for $3500 on Ebay six years ago.
-
I often wonder about this. There is literally no way to ever "prove" your game is MIB really - I guess unless you own an xray machine or something. How do you tell a fake when you're unwilling to open it?
One thing to keep in mind - as people are discussing, a LOT of games were not shrinkwrapped by the manufacturer in the 80s. Some were then later wrapped by the retailer but it's hit and miss on this one. Really, short of shrinkwrapping with a retailer price tag that's clearly from the 80s (could be faked, but not as easy as a shrink job), I don't know that I'd trust any of it. There's just way too much insane markup for MIB games, too much motivation for fraud. I've seen people get shunked on entire cases of 2600 games, MIB and shrinkwrapped, supposedly from an Atari warehouse - when Atari never did this in the first place.
While this is certainly true, Atari actually did start shrink-wrapping their games post-Crash era. Most of the Atari red box games coming out of Venezuela are factory sealed in shrink-wrap. Early Atari first party games were not shrink-wrapped at the factory and the copies that often pop up shrink-wrapped on Ebay and elsewhere were likely shrink-wrapped by the distributor or retailer during the post-crash liquidations or later. It's a tricky problem for sealed collectors, but often there are multiple examples of known sealed copies that can be found and compared to reduce the risk and doubt.
-
I'd only use eBay to unload the stuff you can't sell for reasonable here. Price you pay in commissions to them will definitely add up!
Personally, I'm not interested in bidding and paying attention to timing and bids (only to get sniped at the last second anyway) on a bunch of individual listings, so I'd probably be out if you end up going that route. On the other hand, if you list things at a buck with no reserve, probably end up paying much, much less for most all of the uncommon stuff I offered outright.
Strongly disagree. Ebay and Paypal fees on regular auctions are just 13%. There is no doubt that things will sell for substantially more on Ebay than here and give everyone a fair chance to compete. I can also guarantee that regardless of what you offered here, the Ebay results will be substantially more on every item. The market for this stuff is hot again after a recession induced lull and European bidders in particular are paying crazy amounts for uncommon stuff. Frankly, if you can't be bothered to bid on Ebay, you're not serious about wanting these hard to find items and ultimately you're just afraid that others want them more and will be willing to pay more which is absolutely true. You can't get sniped if you truly bid your maximum and what the market price actually is rather than trying to lowball bids.
-
2
-
-
As much as I'm not a huge fan of the machine that eBay is, that's really where you need to go with these. Let the market decide. You're not going to be disappointed by the sales of the tough ones. Many collectors value the boxes more than the games themselves in this day and age. If you decide to go that direction, please drop a note here to let everyone know. You won't be sorry you did.
Strongly agree. There is no reason to entertain offers here as people who are interested are just as likely to bid on those items on Ebay and there is a whole group of collectors outside of here that scour Ebay daily for rare items like these.
-
Over the last few years I've noticed more and more items that include "estate sale" or "estate sale find" in the sales description. It's also common to see "storage find" and "storage auction" in sales descriptions. These phrases have become pretty common on eBay.
Could someone explain to me why something bought at an estate sale or a storage auction makes an item more desirable? Especially when so many of these items are untested, "no way to test," or "told it was working."
I would understand if it was from the estate of someone famous, some buyers would see added value. But why do we care if it was from the estate of John Doe?
Occasionally these things are from the homes of people who sat there rotting for days, weeks, even months before they were discovered. The property is cleaned up and "disposed of," including through estate auctions. Even though there is no reason to worry about disease, it just feels creepy.
Personally, I read this as a "bought for dirt cheap, nah nah nah nah" sort of a brag. It actually makes me far less likely to buy or bid. Does anyone else react the same way?
I've recently asked other people these questions and no one has an answer. Just wondering...
Personally, I think it's an attempt by the seller to avoid responsibility for defects in the item. I generally interpret it as the seller never owned it until just before the listing on Ebay and they don't know the history of the item or anything much about it. If someone says they have owned it since release on the other hand, it seems like more of a guarantee that it was at least stored properly and probably not defective. Of course, neither way of presenting the item is really any guarantee of anything.
-
2
-
-
Since true shipping cost is a function of size, weight and distance, and is completely unaffected by the price of the item being shipped (except possibly for insurance), your first point is meaningless. Back in my selling days, I was frequently surprised by buyers who thought shipping cost should be capped at some percentage of the purchase price.
Your second point is the important one. The only smart way to buy is to consider the total delivered cost of the item. I don't know whether this seller is padding the shipping cost or not, but I'd rather see him list it this way than to make it $100 BIN with FREE SHIPPING (another trap many buyers fall into).
Agree strongly. If buyers have a question about actual shipping costs, it's very simple to just send a message to the seller before bidding to clarify what service is being used and the weight of the item. If the buyer doesn't like the answer, they just shouldn't bid.
In the TI-99 example being used, it's a fairly heavy computer and like many vintage items, the shipping costs may exceed the actual value. The seller is not responsible for subsidizing shipping simply because something is not worth the combined item cost and shipping to any particular buyer. Frankly, I rarely see inflated shipping now that Ebay is really cracking down and actually takes a percentage of shipping costs as part of the final calculations.
-
This article is a few weeks old and I have no idea as to its validity but it does mention that sellers will still not be forced to offer returns at all.
I think there is just confusion over the difference between "offering returns" and Ebay's mandatory policy requiring sellers to accept returns of merchandise that is not as described. The information is still accurate that no seller has to offer unconditional returns. If someone buys something and then just decides they don't want it, a seller can refuse to accept a return and that has always been the case and likely will continue to be.
At the same time, no seller can refuse to accept a return if the item is not described. Frankly, as I've stated multiple times in this thread, sellers have always had to accept returns for items not as described and all this does is force sellers to pay return shipping for not as described items. I still maintain that there will be no upsurge in fraud as for buyers really intent on defrauding an Ebay seller, paying return shipping is never going to represent a significant deterrent and we would have seen massive return fraud for many years leading up to this. Even not as described issues are relatively rare and I think out of the thousands of items I have bought on Ebay, I may have had to return maybe 50 over 17 years or roughly one item every few months. I suspect that's pretty average for high vclume buyers and will continue to be even under this new program.
-
Dear Moderator:
I think its time to close this thread, its went way off target. We get the same things on ebay forums. There's always some buyer who jumps in and tries to make bad buyers look ok and downgrades sellers. I know the type have dealt with them for years.
I appologize to anyone I have offended, except bojay I don't appologize to them. Gl with this great site and tks for letting me voice the ebay sellers side of view.
Comedy gold my friend, comedy gold.
-
I know it's rare, the pictures make it look in great shape and the story matches up with what I know about them....but half a million? Really?
The guy has been listing and re-listing the game for a few years now. Several collectors have tried to explain that the real value is probably closer to like $5K, but he just becomes belligerent and jacks the price up further each time. It will never sell and ultimately, this guy will die or go bankrupt and it will find its way back into the market at a more reasonable price someday.
-
Seems you know everything about everything, never wrong, and love to argue about things you don't have a clue on. Does anyone personally know this person, how old are they? By ur name I take it you can be at most 17 yr old(2014-1997=17). Which means you don't have a clue and have never sold on ebay. Do you have any concept of how life works in the real world(outside Mom/Dads house). You did not see my claim so how can you know what happened, all you can do is make immature opinions. I'm 59 and been in the business world for twice the yrs than you been alive. When you get half my experiance in dealing with scamers in the business world, then you have the knowledge for an intelligent reply, until then can someone tell me if there's an IGNOR button for posters on your forums.
If you had bothered to read my posts, you would have seen that I have been on Ebay over 17 years. In that time I have bought and occasionally sold literally thousands of items. I have also had a number of claims against bad sellers in that time and so I am very familiar with how Ebay treats claims and the way in which they evaluate buyer and seller accounts. While I may not be a senior citizen like yourself, I am an adult and the 1997 refers to the year I obtained my primary e-mail address, so I use that on forums I frequent. In any event, someone's age has nothing to do with their level of intelligence or common sense nor necessarily reflects their experience. For example, you're purportedly 59 years old and yet you repeatedly misspell basic words like "ignore" and "experience" and "scammers". Should we all discard your opinions simply because of your poor grammar? Frankly, anyone who constantly threatens to block or ignore others on a forum simply for stating their opinions is probably not mentally stable as all you would need to do if you were serious is just skip over my posts and yet you have felt the need to keep responding to them.
Again you don't have a clue. I ask those who have been posting in here for a long time. Does this person always act like this, he's right everyone else is wrong. Please, if there's an ignor button, point me to it.
If the package is 1st class or Priority, the post office will pick it up at your HOME! You don't have to drive to the P.O. to return. It would supprise you what lengths some people will go thru just to try/rent something for FREE.(Brides, Vacationers, one time repairs, etc.)
Also scamming Target, Kmart, Walmart compared to ebay is as differant as night and day, you don't have a clue. Ebay never sees the item, all they care about is pleaseing the buyer, those Big Box stores inspect returns ebay doesn't, ebay takes the buyers word.
So, I guess you don't really want to ignore me at all? Not sure why a newbie like yourself registered solely for the purpose of posting in an Ebay bashing thread. I would assume you're some kind of conspiracy/secret government nut job, am I right?
-
They really rare for the Mac or something? Just bought a similar like new example for the Amiga - $10 shipped.
Factory sealed it's pretty hard to find. There is a small and apparently wealthy classic Mac collecting community out there. I think either J&K or Peter Olafson had a sealed copy of this maybe six months back and it broke $100 from what I recall. The Commodore, ST, and Amiga versions were released later and are all much easier to find.
-
1
-
-
If the item is worth a decent amount of money, they damn will take the time and effort. People are cheap, and honesty hides much easier on the internet. I have no doubt there will be an increase in returned items now that buyers don't foot the return shipping bill ESPECIALLY if it's a large item worth more than a few dollars AND return shipping is high from an item being large and/or heavy (as mentioned, a Commodore monitor)
I'm from Canada and shipping even small items costs in the $15 - $20 range. This US-centric thinking regarding cheap shipping costs is a non-factor for the rest of us.
Again, the incentive is already there now and has been for years. If someone wants to scam you out of a few hundred dollar item, do you really think shipping costs are going to serve as a deterrent? Do you really think there are large packs of classic game and computer collectors looking to scam people selling $50 monitors? I just don't buy it and people have been making these kinds of claims about Ebay since I joined over 17 years ago and every year sales have increased and the variety and uniqueness of items has only gotten better and better. Prices also haven't spiked on most items and certainly not because a few sellers fall away because they are afraid that their profit will be reduced due to some new buyer friendly policy. Heck, I remember when sellers were all going to quit over Paypal becoming essentially mandatory for most auctions and Ebay setting limits on shipping and then taking a percentage of shipping. It never happened and it won't happen this time either.
-
Not trying to argue or make anyone mad, but this is how it is. Unless you been in a sellers shoes who was scamed you don't have a clue.
Selling on ebay is a Federal Interstate Internet Act and ebay has to follow Fed. Laws.
I got scamed by a buyer, ebay removed a full refund from my paypal account, and told buyer they did not have to return the item. I filed a complaint with the IC3(Internet Crime Complaint Center), then I called ebay and told them. The immediately transferred me to a supervisor who appologized and within the hour the refund was put back into my paypal account. EBAY does break the law but not many know what to do, its not state law its Federal.
Ebay has not finally protected buyers, ebay has been doing that for yrs while bashing sellers. You say Good sellers won't be impacted, those are the ones who will get hit the hardest. Ebay for some will turn into EBAY RENTAL, how? Bride needs a dress, buys it, wears it, soils it on wedding night, then files complaint Not As Discribed and seller pays shipping back. Bride got a dress for free. Other things like ATARI GAMES, CONSOLES, Tools need only for a week or 2, Vacation items needed for a week, Prom dresses, Suits, etc.
Say you need to roof your backporch, you buy a USED air nail gun from ebay, roof you porch, then return "Not As DIscribed" and seller pay $15-$20 return shipping. Anything a person would rent can now be had at EBAY FOR FREE.
When a buyer racks up to many NOT AS DISCRIBED claims, they just delete that account and make a new one. Ebay could care less, if a item is returned Not As Discribed the SELLER does NOT GET a final value fee refund. Its a win win thing for ebay, sellers loose their butts but ebay still keeps the fees.
Please don't tell me honest buyers will not do this. Here's an example.
Honest Harry wants a to buy a old rare game, a used one cost $30 but he's afraid to spend $30 for a game he may not like. NOW, he doesn't have to fight the urge to not buy cause he knows if he doesn't like the game all he has to do is say its not as discribed and seller foots the bill. HE PAYS NOTHING TO TRY THE GAME. Honest buyers will start doing this," TEST ITEMS FOR FREE " or rent.
Ebay gave you a refund because they didn't want to deal with a complaint, not because they broke any laws. Amazon does the same thing for buyers and sellers. Rather than spend time and resources on arguing with you, they will occasionally just compensate the buyer and the seller and handle it that way. As for your other point, the free return shipping is simply not a big enough incentive for people to engage in the scamming you are talking about. There is still a lot of hassle involved in getting a return approved by Ebay and it takes time and effort to drive to the post office and actually mail something back. People are far more likely to do this kind of scamming with local stores with liberal return policies and with Target and Kmart and Costco already offering virtually limitless returns, there's no way someone is going to turn to Ebay as a source of goods they want to rent.
Like us on Facebook
Follow us on Twitter
AtariAge on Instagram
Watch us on YouTube
Chat on Discord
Huge trash find of vintage video game boxes
in Buy, Sell, and Trade
Posted
I'm sorry, but this is absurd. People should feel free to come here asking for advice (as this guy did) and not feel like they are obligated to sell something below market value or favor the members here over anyone else. This isn't the only classic collecting site on the planet and just because most of us are collectors, we don't have some special status that entitles us to discount pricing or first dibs on things.
Why should the seller sell all of the boxes to you? Are you a museum or non-profit that is going to make them available to the world to enjoy free of charge? Or, are you just another guy looking to skim off the boxes you want and then sell the rest at a profit to pay for your hobby? Personally, I try to post extra items I get in the marketplace forums here at below market value, but that's not something I expect other people to do and frankly, this is a very unusual find and one that deserves to be sold on the open market for whatever people are willing to pay.