i have a few questions about ebay?

Question

i am new to ebay. i'm buying cars nad one of my questions is that when i make a bid another instant bid appears higher than mine. but at the end of the sell. when i log into ebay i see the car one more time and the last bid before the sell ended was at 453.00 but when the sell time ended the winner's bid was 219. why? this are my other questions. are you forced to buy the item you're the winner at?what about the seller, is he forced as well? i want to buy, fix and resell the cars back here in houston. plz someone help

thanks

Answer 1

2nd question first: The winner and seller are both forced to complete the deal. There's no law, but Ebay will kick you out.

1st question: It's possible that the highest bidder backed out, which will probably get him banned from Ebay, and then the seller chose to offer it to the next highest bidder.
.

Answer 2

eBay uses a system called 'proxy bidding' which means you put in your highest bid, but only the minimum needed to win shows. Then if others come along and bid, but less than your high bid, eBay automatically raises your high bid to keep you on top. So say you put in a high bid of $500, but the minimum bid the seller wanted was $250, so the $250 is all that'll show your bid as. Now someone else comes along and they figure they'll pay $350 for the car, so they bid $350, but because your high bid was still above theirs, eBay will bump your bid up over theirs to still show you as the high bidder.

There are also people who bid on eBay called snipers. They'll find an auction they want to win, and wait until the last few seconds, then put in their high bid to 'snipe' the auction to win it when there isn't time for anyone to outbid them. Sometimes they win it, sometimes the original bidder's high bid was still higher, so all it does is jack up their bid.

As for if you're required to buy and they're required to sell, yes. eBay sales are considered legally binding contracts on both ends. There was recently a court case where a seller was ordered to sell a rare plane that didn't make as much money as he wanted and he wanted to back out of it. The courts sided with the buyer that he was legally obligated to sell it for that amount.

Answer 3

Hi! 453 must have been his highest offer but since no one bid more than 218 or so he got it for 219. Bidding is a contract and if you bid you should definitely be serious. Same with selling. No one is "forced" but it will really hurt a buyer or seller's status on eBay if someone doesn't go through with the deal, which will make it hard to do business on eBay in the future. Good luck and happy bidding!