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Do eBay buyers ever ask you to sell outside of eBay?

Offline Travis

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Do eBay buyers ever ask you to sell outside of eBay?
« on: January 06, 2014, 10:57:56 PM »
Just got an email from a guy who offered to purchase an item I'm selling on eBay for about 30% more than the current bid. He wants to send funds via PayPal, then he wants me to cancel the auction. He made a very fair offer. He seems legit, has good feedback and thousands of transactions.

I don't sell a lot of stuff on eBay, so I wouldn't know if this is a scam or not. What are the risks and how should I protect myself if I decide to proceed?

Offline MovieMan

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Re: Do eBay buyers ever ask you to sell outside of eBay?
« Reply #1 on: January 06, 2014, 11:45:19 PM »
Just got an email from a guy who offered to purchase an item I'm selling on eBay for about 30% more than the current bid. He wants to send funds via PayPal, then he wants me to cancel the auction. He made a very fair offer. He seems legit, has good feedback and thousands of transactions.

I don't sell a lot of stuff on eBay, so I wouldn't know if this is a scam or not. What are the risks and how should I protect myself if I decide to proceed?

If your item is sitting at $66 and he is offering another $18 or so (for a total of $84) it might be because he thinks it's going to go for more than that...say $100.  When they try that with me I usually just tell them to bid their max (the $84) and they will probably get it for less (or at the most, the $84).

They don't lose anything if they win it between $66 and $84, and you still win. If it goes higher than that they might continue on anyway. If they don't then you will be getting more than the $84 from someone else.

The only down side to you is if the auction bogs down and you only end up with the $66, but personally I'd rather go for the other bids. 

With a little over a day left your item is currently at $76 so my example above is fairly accurate I think !  ;

Offline amc

Re: Do eBay buyers ever ask you to sell outside of eBay?
« Reply #2 on: January 07, 2014, 02:23:29 AM »
and Ebay really frowns on it and if you do it enough times you could be in trouble with them

Offline Travis

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Re: Do eBay buyers ever ask you to sell outside of eBay?
« Reply #3 on: January 07, 2014, 06:00:03 AM »
If your item is sitting at $66 and he is offering another $18 or so (for a total of $84) it might be because he thinks it's going to go for more than that...say $100.  When they try that with me I usually just tell them to bid their max (the $84) and they will probably get it for less (or at the most, the $84).

They don't lose anything if they win it between $66 and $84, and you still win. If it goes higher than that they might continue on anyway. If they don't then you will be getting more than the $84 from someone else.

The only down side to you is if the auction bogs down and you only end up with the $66, but personally I'd rather go for the other bids. 

With a little over a day left your item is currently at $76 so my example above is fairly accurate I think !  ;

Have I ever posted a link to my eBay account? I swear the NSA is going to be knocking on your door - to offer you employment. But yes, I think you're right. Not sure why the bids are north of $60, when I was doing my research, I thought that similar items were selling in the $50-60 range. It could be because these center caps are in exceptionally good condition.

Perhaps I'll just let it ride. The last item that someone wanted me to sell outside of eBay was a used pair of wheat Jordan 13's. They ended up selling for 3X the guy's offer. I couldn't understand why they were selling for over $250 when you could buy a new version for $120. Turned out, they were a rare size that was in high demand. Go figure.

Offline MovieMan

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Re: Do eBay buyers ever ask you to sell outside of eBay?
« Reply #4 on: January 07, 2014, 08:49:37 AM »
Have I ever posted a link to my eBay account?

No.

Sets of four have sold for $100 to $125. Singles have sold for $25 to $40.



Re: Do eBay buyers ever ask you to sell outside of eBay?
« Reply #5 on: January 07, 2014, 12:08:14 PM »
Or.. you could create a buy it now auction for his asking price and send him a link directly. Give him a deadline to complete the payment. Once he pays, cancel the other auction. If he doesn't pay, cancel the buy it now.

Offline rulesforrebels

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Re: Do eBay buyers ever ask you to sell outside of eBay?
« Reply #6 on: January 07, 2014, 02:44:19 PM »
Make sure you never leave a papertrail through ebay organizing an off ebay transaction. If I'm not mistaken ebay also forbids you to exchange personal emails through ebay messaging which makes it hard to communicate with a buyer to arrange an off ebay deal.

The plus side to you is you avoid ebay fees. You still have Paypal seller protection and buyer still has Paypal buyer protection. I guess there really is no negative to you.

I have an 800 number not sure how they feel about personal numbers but if someone asks for larger quantities or something and I think they are trying to go off ebay I'll normally say I have my 800 number on all my listings, please contact me to discuss. They will calla nd I can arrange that way with no paper trail.

If I do write back I'll say something like contact me to discuss and I can put up a special listing just for you, so on papaer looks like I'm goinna go through ebay even though they gonna call me and we can arrange something off ebay

Offline Travis

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Re: Do eBay buyers ever ask you to sell outside of eBay?
« Reply #7 on: January 07, 2014, 07:47:27 PM »
If I'm not mistaken ebay also forbids you to exchange personal emails through ebay messaging which makes it hard to communicate with a buyer to arrange an off ebay deal.

Yeah, in order to provide the buyer with my email address I had to write it like this:  example (at) mywebsite.com

Offline rulesforrebels

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Re: Do eBay buyers ever ask you to sell outside of eBay?
« Reply #8 on: January 07, 2014, 09:20:21 PM »
Yeah, in order to provide the buyer with my email address I had to write it like this:  example (at) mywebsite.com

no, you don't want to do that for two reasons. first off ebay has pretty sophisticated technology that monitors messages and stuff. more importantly though, if you get into a dispute with a buyer they have leverage to threaten you to tell ebay you were arranging offers off ebay.

i know some people dont like giving hteir phone number out, ifthats you just use the "burner" app which creates fake numbers for your calls, you can choose the area code. just send a message saying call me to discuss. ebay doesn't seem to have a problem with exchanging phone numbers like they do email. then discuss and arrange over the phone. dont give people your email through messaing, its a recipe to get booted from ebay

Offline dbr831

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Re: Do eBay buyers ever ask you to sell outside of eBay?
« Reply #9 on: January 08, 2014, 09:34:33 AM »
It happens occasionally. Seems like it is usually someone nearby but not always. In one case I had tons of miniatures from a closed miniatures store. There were these little porcelain vases. I had about 1600 of them. I was selling them on ebay in lots of 5 then 10 then 20, each time a slightly better deal because I wanted to get rid of them. I think the lots of 20 were $25.00. I would list 10 lots of 20 and the same person would buy them all. We finally exchanged phone numbers and made a deal off ebay for the rest of them. I think I had almost 1500 left at that point and she paid me $1400 for them. No fees. I do make sure to never make a deal in writing though. For me it's nice to avoid fees but not sure what the benefit is for the buyer.

Offline rulesforrebels

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Re: Do eBay buyers ever ask you to sell outside of eBay?
« Reply #10 on: January 09, 2014, 10:29:12 AM »
It happens occasionally. Seems like it is usually someone nearby but not always. In one case I had tons of miniatures from a closed miniatures store. There were these little porcelain vases. I had about 1600 of them. I was selling them on ebay in lots of 5 then 10 then 20, each time a slightly better deal because I wanted to get rid of them. I think the lots of 20 were $25.00. I would list 10 lots of 20 and the same person would buy them all. We finally exchanged phone numbers and made a deal off ebay for the rest of them. I think I had almost 1500 left at that point and she paid me $1400 for them. No fees. I do make sure to never make a deal in writing though. For me it's nice to avoid fees but not sure what the benefit is for the buyer.

once someone buys from you, at that point you have their email address so can safely just email them right off ebay, say hey you been buying all my such and such, we've had a few successful transactions. if we take this off ebay it saves me 13% in fees and I can pass some of that savings along to you.

the problem i think travis was facing is if someone hasn't bought from you, you don't have any contact info from them, all you know is their ebay name and only have the abiliity to message or contact them through the ebay system

Offline alloro

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Re: Do eBay buyers ever ask you to sell outside of eBay?
« Reply #11 on: January 10, 2014, 09:35:00 AM »
Just got an email from a guy who offered to purchase an item I'm selling on eBay for about 30% more than the current bid. He wants to send funds via PayPal, then he wants me to cancel the auction.

Don't do it. The guy can receive the item then put a charge back claim with PayPal for a refund and you have no seller protection. There is a solution though, Modify your listing to have a 'buy it now' price along with the auction bidding. Set the 'buy it now' price for what the guy offered. This way he can buy it immediately for the agreed price and your butt is still covered.

Re: Do eBay buyers ever ask you to sell outside of eBay?
« Reply #12 on: January 10, 2014, 09:52:09 AM »
Thee buy it now option is good but it defeats the purpose of the deal.  Getting out of Ebay's fees.

Offline alloro

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Re: Do eBay buyers ever ask you to sell outside of eBay?
« Reply #13 on: January 10, 2014, 09:57:57 AM »
Thee buy it now option is good but it defeats the purpose of the deal.  Getting out of Ebay's fees.

You pay fees either way, but get hit with one charge back and see how much it costs you when you're out the item and what you paid to ship it.

Re: Do eBay buyers ever ask you to sell outside of eBay?
« Reply #14 on: January 10, 2014, 10:37:20 AM »
You don't get hit with fees if you cancel an item.  But you are right about the chargeback.


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