What is the deal with ebay knives?

A

amw308

Joined
Jun 20, 2003
Messages
81
I was looking at knives on ebay the other day thinking that i would find some good deals. But every knife i looked at was way over priced. I would assume it is possible to find a good deal on ebay, but from what i saw they must be few and far between. The average price for a leatherman wave was selling for was about $60. I could go to walmart and get one for $55 new in the box and not have to pay shipping or wait on it to arrive. I'm not sure what the point of this post is, venting i guess, but if you have some input on this phenomenon feel free to share.
 
amw308 said:
...I would assume it is possible to find a good deal on ebay, but from what i saw they must be few and far between.
Click to expand...

Good deals are very few; buyer beware. :)
 
Good deals can be had on ebay.

But you have to know your prices and you have to be willing to put in the time to search them out.
 
I have found that some folks just love to participate in "the auction experience". It's like a Disneyland ride they gladly pay for. I have gotten a few good deals on Ebay and they are few and far between.You also have to know how to use Ebay. Last week I saw an item bid up to $40 and yet there was another seller selling the exact item with a buy-it-now price of $35. Go figure. Like Art Linkletter said, "people are funny".
 
Just have to play the waiting game & watever your looking for will appear sooner or later.


I have noticed that lately as well. The prices are all pretty lousy on there. If a private individual & not a actual store owner is selling on there, then you might get a good deal....otherwise the store owner people are not giving you any breaks :grumpy:


But as some individuals will tell you ...."it's mint" that's not always the case. I have purchased alot of knives off of there & you can tell which ones have been carried a few times or have been cut with & then you try to argue it out with the guy who sold it to you.....sometimes it's just NOT worth the grief. That's why if your looking for a knife in preticular, just go under google.com & search for it there....or frugal.com.
 
It does pay to do your homework on ebay, I routinely see 40th anniversary Buck 110's go on ebay for 50+ when you can buy them at Smokey Mountain for 39.95.

But I have a theory as to why a lot of knoves go to high on ebay.

1. The majority of knife buyers on ebay are male.
2. The male ego hates to lose.
3. They over bid in the heat of the auction.

since I sell a lot on ebay I like it!

Men...we are predictable!
 
I bought 10 of the limited edition BM 941 carbon fiber d2's at 120 a pop and sold them all for around or over $200(highest was 230$!) on fleabay once.

I grabbed a brand new vg-10 Spyderco Mouse for 39 bones once too.
I've noticed those high prices lately though too! crazy.
 
Then again, some bidders on E-Bay really have NO clue as to what the actual cost on the item they are bidding on. They get outbid & they retaliate driving the price up & up. Good for the seller, bad for the bidders. Then other sellers "see" what it sold for & think that they too can sell there identical item for the same, keeping the price high again. :(


Example: A silly Benchmade banner. I picked one up for $24 brand new.


I noticed an identical one that I picked up sold about a month ago for something like $120 something! :eek:


A fool & his/her money were soon parted :D
 
Hey guys,

I watch ebay pretty much constantly for a wide variety of items, knives included. Buying a knife on ebay is pretty much a waste of time, 99.9% of the time. Sometimes though, you _can_ find a decent deal. You have to be pretty deligent, as well as know exactly what the knife is worth.

Me, I pretty much use ebay to sell knives that I would either have a hard time trading off for items of equal value, or if I simply want to liquidate the knife at the best possible price. Like anything you sell; you need to know your market, and what it's willing to pay.

I would say I do 99% of my buying from fellow forum members. Why? The answer is simple; no bullshit. Members are always willing to give other members great deals, work with them on payment, and hell, most will even give you an inspection period! Try getting that anywhere else.

At this time, my verdict is to use ebay to sell...not buy.
 
My first day after registering on e-bay I found a $30 camillus boot knife with a bid of $1.00 on it and a few hours left....I put it up to $1.50 and paid $5.50 all together....

I spent atleast 2 hours a day for a week after that trying to find some more "steals"....I couldn't. I've tried a few more times after that, but no luck. Mainly just looking for people who don't put a reserve on stuff and have a low starting bid....only the last couple of minutes matter. My soon to be ex-wife gets "steals" all the time on girly stuff...and I watch cars on there every now and then which it seems a lot of not too bright people get "stolen" from them.

If the person has 100 or more sells then you probably won't have much luck...maybe save 10% if you're lucky.

Most of the knives on there anyway are frost cutlery and other junk with crazy names for really cheap that people think they will make a living buying 50 knives for $100 and selling them for $5-20 each.
 
I'm going to swim against what seems to be the current here, but I have found a lot of good deals on ebay, and for the most part my experience there has been pretty positive. But you have to use two traits: diligence and patience. I probably spend about two hours a day looking at knives on ebay -- not just to buy, but also to get a good idea of general costs. If I'm interested in a specific knife, I price it on more than one dealer's website to compare to ebay prices. When I start bidding on a knife, I set myself a top limit of what I'm willing to pay for that knife.

Ebay can also be a good source for knives that have been out of production for several years.

I would say that at least 90% of my ebay buying experience has been positive.
 
I sell quite a few items on ebay including knives. It is true that ebay can be like a wild ride however, one should always research as to how much they are will to pay and what the going rate at stores are.

On the flipside, it is sometimes more cheaper to buy something on ebay and have it delivered to your door step than sometimes driving all over town and wasting gas and time. Especially if you live in California.

An interesting note: I have put quite a few items on ebay with "buy it now" and have never really had much luck with it. Go figure.....

By the way, my ebay user name is bestcounsel as well.
 
I think a lot of the problem is that people who don't do their research drive the price up thinking it is worth it. But, it is wierd if you look some other products they are consitently good deals. I was looking at clay poker chips which would be a few hundred dollars retail and they routinely sell for around $60 new on ebay. Go figure.
 
It depends what you look for many times. I see many good deals on ebay. I can find many things cheaper than what I can get them for from a normal dealer. Many of those being sold are FROM actual dealers.
Some dealers use Ebay to move out slow moving items that they can't sell on thier website for the prices they do on Ebay.

Use a little common sense, don't get caught up in a bidding war, and you can get some decent to very good deals.
 
Another good one is tools. People will pay monster money for old crusty beat up "snap-off" tools just for the name, when you can get new and better stuff(ei FACOM) for 1/3 the price.
 
I have made hundreds of purchases on eBay.

Only two of them were knives.

Knife deals are rare on eBay, and they are made harder to find because you have to sift through all of the bad-a$$-wannabee-fantasy-mallninja-spacemonkey-hibben-designed-made-in-china-or-worse crap.

I collect estate pipes, Coca-cola stuff and antique maps and bookends. I regularly find excellent deals on these items on eBay.

If I want a new Swisstool or Benchmade though, I am not going to even look for it there. I'll buy it from 1SKS to support Spark and the forums, or from Smokey Mountain if price is a big deal.

My little brother collects vintage FS daggers, and he has found some good deals on eBay and he has also been burned a time or two. If you are diligent I'm sure it can be worth your while to look for antique or limited edition cutlery on eBay, but I cannot imagine too many situations where buying a new, current production item of cutlery at online auction would be worth the hassle.
 
Its market saturation. As more dealers move to Ebay sales, they will know what works to ensure that they get the most money every time. They will not set up no reserve auctions, will set the starting price high enough to still look good and cover their expenses.

So while you can still find many deals, as people say you have to either id what dealers give the most consistent best deals, or just hope for that little old lady selling stuff off at 1/3 its value.
 
a big part of ebay for some is using paypal - i like to buy with paypal debiting from my checking account versus using a credit card
 
I have gotten some very good knife deals on egay
Keen Kutter automatic fish knife with blade etch for 300 mint condition. Press button knife co autofork for 435.00 near mint. etc you just have to know where to look and when to give up and wait for the next one to come along :D
 
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