people who does what Recall says pretty much wants a highballed answer, period. If they wanted "reasonable price" they would have put the price on it. However, they will always laugh at your lowball offers.
I had someone offer me $9.99 for Botcon Thrust on Ebay as a best offer. I responded with that despite it being a very generous offer, that I would have to decline. Most people who see my collection ask if I know the value and I just throw out an estimate. As for kids who see my collection I have several Transformers set aside for them to play with, so if they do get broken, it's no big deal.
Recall speaks the truth. I absolutely hate when people don't give you any idea on what you seek. What harm comes from putting a price for people to get an idea if it is worth their time. Say someone wanted to get a movie 1 Bonecrusher, and the seller didn't have a price. The buyer sends a PM offering $25 for it, yet the seller wants $100 for some crazy reason. The seller than laughs and calls the buyer an idiot because he wants a rediculous amount. Had that Buyer known he wanted such a high price, he probably wouldn't of wasted his time. It makes it easier for both parties just to add that number. I'm not taking the "lowballers" side, but I am not taking the sellers side for refusing to make it easier, and preventing some lowball offers. I myself am not one to respond with something rude. I will respond in a polite manner, and move on.
This still happens to me on eVILbay. I generally do not post stuff there because I cannot stand them but that is another topic for discussion. On to the point. At the shows I have my stuff priced so people know where I am coming from. Most of the time I am willing to take less and I for one like to haggle. To me it's part of the fun, if you really want something you will fight a little for it. I remember this year at Botcon when a kid wanted a toy. He asked how much as it was up high and the sticker was kinda hard to read. I replied $25. He already started getting the money out. I asked, aren't you gonna haggle a little"? He said, oh $20 I then replied that sounds good to me. His father could not believe it. It was fun, the boy got what he wanted and I enjoyed myself seeing his and his fathers expression. But there are times when I do not know what to put on an item as it has been a while since I saw one for sale or because of it being so rare. I do put open to offers. When I get a lowball offer I just say sorry I could not sell it for that. Most of the time people will understand but every now and then, someone gets pissed. Oh well, life is too short, move on and bug someone else.
Not that I'm asking my Buyers to be "psychic" about the prices I would be expecting for my items but I'll at least expect the Buyer to be "sensible" before proposing an offer. Sometimes people just have to spoil your day by giving you all the ridiculous lowball offers you can ever imagine. Examples? USD $20 for an EX-02 Sonic Convoy, USD $2 for Botcon '07 Games Of Deception Boxset, USD $150 for an MISB & AFA ready C-327 Victory Leo. (I can think of alot more but I'll avoid doing that because it ain't worth getting fired up in that sense) So I don't go around lowballing people, just like I don't appreciate people doing the same thing to me. I wanna believe in good karma.
EX-02 Sonic Convoy: I don't know what that is. Games of Deception: Ok, clearly a lowball, but $2? That's a lowball for anything. You were being trolled. C-327 Victory Leo: I don't know what that is either. Not everybody is savvy on the Japanese toys. $150 is a lot of money, so this may have been innocent and not some attempt to piss you off.
EX-02 Sonic Convoy is the boxset of Galaxy Convoy (Cybertron Optimus Prime), Sonic Bomber (Wing Saber) and a remolded Ramble. optimus has the majority of the figure molded in translucent plastic and theres some chrome differences of Sonic Bomber. Victory Leo is a orange and black mechanical lion type TF that can combine with Star Saber.
As a buyer, sometimes I haggle, sometimes I don't. Of course I'd like to get a great deal, but really, I just want a fair price. That ranges from under retail to well over retail depending on the item, obviously. In general, on the boards, I feel like I should be paying less than ebay's top prices. As a seller, some items I don't mind letting go fairly cheap, but there are certain things I'll sell that are the 'money-makers' so to speak. There are only certain toys that carry retail of higher value from the main lines of the last decade, so those I'd like to sell for pretty close to market value to make the sale a success. As mentioned, shipping can be sticky - i usually end up eating a few dollars after box, packing materials, tape, shipping are totaled. Part of the game, I guess. I've run up against two frustrating experiences...one, I had put out feelers for a Botcon Alpha Trion and had been contacted by a seller. We had sent a few PM's back and forth ironing out price, shipping, etc and in response to my PM that was agreeing to the terms, he says he has just sold it to someone else. *grrr*. I had no clue he was talking with anyone else from the tone or content of his PM's. I found one for a better price not long after, but it was quite frustrating. The second experience is the first time I've been burned on an online deal (in 15 or so years of interactions). I'd done business successfully with this person before and communication was slightly patchy, but there. I sent him several figs and gifted some cash for custom work. He responded a few times initially, but has dropped off the face of the earth - I'm holding out some hope that he'll return, but that was a tough pill to swallow. Smaller deals or no gifted payments in the future. Yay for 1K
ebay was the worst for bad offers, 150 for defensor and menasor giftsets, they ended at almost 1000 (Together) i've gotten some offers when i was selling stuff on here, mostly people wanting stuff for $10 shipped, when shipping from here is minimum $8 and the figure's going rate at the time was 40 or so, and others asking for free stuff, sometimes when i sell a lot to someone, i'll throw something in, but if it is a first time buyer wanting a $5 figure, not gonna happen victory leo is worth a lot more than that opened, nevermind misb
Sorry mate, "not knowing what's what" certainly doesn't give anyone a right to lowball. In our world where Internet & technology had since become more advanced, one could easily find relevant information & then reference/educate themselves from there. On the case of that Victory Leo, I do believe that it wasn't an "innocent attempt" or sorts... ...Not when the Buyer had proclaimed himself to be a seasoned Collector that has a magnificent TFs collection consisting of mostly AFA pieces. Face it, the dude knows what he's up against.
While it's true that not every TF collector is savvy about rare Japanese G1 figures, I have to agree with Automorpher in that it's not hard to do a little bit of research on just what it is you're making an offer on. There are so many TF-related websites with a wealth of information (TFWiki, TFU.INFO, etc.). It's almost inexcusable to not have some sort of idea on the rarity and worth of something, especially if you're an experienced collector and have access to the aforementioned resources.
^ Neither of those websites gives the slightest indication what a proper offer on a toy should be in USD or any other currency. Neither even uses the word rare, and there are plenty of rare TFs that aren't worth too much. Automorpher, regarding Victory Leo, evidently the guy was either a liar/blowhard, or just wanted to see if you were an idiot or something. Not that either behavior is excusable. In my particular case, I honestly wouldn't know what a VL is worth if you guys weren't talking about it just now. $150 sounds like a pretty high offer for 95% of all the Transformers that have ever been released, so without the supporting information you offered I wasn't seeing what was so inexcusable about it.
I was just citing those as good sources of information. They may not tell you what the "going price" is for them, but they can give you a history of the mold (what year it was released, under which market, exclusivity, how many times it's been remolded/retooled, etc.). Said history can give you a loose idea of a toy's rarity in comparison to more recent lines. I've used those websites to learn a quite a bit about Japanese G1 in recent years. For prices, and I should've cited this in my last post, I read up about them in the forums, trends in eBay auctions/listings, etc. So, in a way, my point still stands.
Ok, here is the final say though: Its true. If people do their research, they would offer correctly, unless they have selfish or deceiving motives. HOWEVER If everyone thinks straight before anyone do anything, the world would be vastly different from what it is today. Common sense, is a rare thing. If we always follow the basic rules of logic, we wouldn't be humans now would we?
And even though I agree with Automorpher in doing that little bit of research, I'm still of the school of thought that you should include an asking price when selling something. Being specific can save a lot of time and deter people from making lowball offers.
As far as haggling, it is part of the fun. I generally pay what people are asking on the boards, cause what I am looking for is generally fairly priced, I will sometimes haggle 20% or so if the seller seems willing, but usually stay away from making what I would consider lowball offers if I feel that they are way out of my pricerange. Usually I just pay the price cause sellers on here are more than fair. I ran into one where someone had prices listed which seemed reasonable and I said I would take an item for $40 (price he was asking) if he still had it. My reply was, "someone already said they would take it for $40, but if you want to offer me more, I will sell it to you instead". Something about poaching from another board member who already had a deal made felt wrong to me, and I left it at that.
I agree with that, but I think it depends on the seller's policy. If it was "best offer" and it hasn't been agreed on, that's a diff. story
It's pretty easy to tell when you're getting PM offers from a broke little kid. Of course they want something for nothing, they probably cut grass for their toy money. I know I did when I was 12. Easily ignored.
I've made some shitty offers. Everything people have offered me seems fair ... aside for a $1 for my G1 Bee and Cliffy.
