I recently had an item on eBay which I started at $200 thinking I would get about $300 for it.
Right off the bat (day 1 of 5) it got the $200 bid. Next day it got upped to $202 by bidder #2.
A couple of days later the 2nd bidder wants to bow out ..."lost my job"...he said. He didn't know how to back out himself and I just emailed him and told him to let it ride and IF he won I would take care of it from there and would be able to offer 2nd chance to bidder #1.
He agreed that was OK. Final 5 minutes of auction comes and bidder #3 comes in..I see his bid at $255 and when I looked at all bids, the 2nd bidder that placed a $250 bid (earlier when he placed his $202).
Final outcome the 3rd bidder gets it for his $255. So here was my logic.
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By allowing the defaulting buyer to coast on through to the end I hoped the first bidder would come back even to $205. It was a little more than dumb luck as there were 120 views and 10 watchers so there was a chance that ANYONE of those would beat out the deadbeat bidder.
Worked out good as it happened because the first bidder was nowhere to be seen and of the 10 watchers, only the 3rd bidder came foward. Topping it off...immediate payment !