Jim:
The eBay online auction company has been around for many years and up until recently I had not been using it to get the incredible deals I should have been getting for years. Much of the survival gear that a prepper needs is often highly durable and will last a life time, so buying them second hand on eBay is a wise choice.
The first thing to consider is your List of Lists. Consider what you need from reloading supplies, body armor, tactical gear, weapon accessories, clothing, or surplus goods. Now make a list of key words that are associated with all these items. Sometimes a simply searching for a few key words related to the item you are actually searching for will result in a great find at a great price. When searching for items make certain you use the search result filters located on the left of the screen. [JWR Adds: Also be sure to search for common spelling errors in auction titles that will cause auctions to get overlooked. For example, if “camouflage” is misspelled “camoflage”, of if “gauge” is misspelled “guage” or “gage”, then there is good chance that there will be few bidders.]
When searching for high quality gear like Trijicon ACOGs, or well made Tactical gear, don’t be afraid of checking the “used” box. You will see that all this used stuff is still serviceable and often half price. I have bought many vests for the family, accessories for weapons, or other supplies at 80% off. Its pretty incredible sometimes. Look through your search results and add any items of interest to your watch list, this is done by simply clicking the item link, then clicking on “Add to watch list”.
Once you have added everything you are interested in to your watch list, consider your budget, and narrow it down to the items you are really gunning for. The next part is bidding. I am the scourge of every decent human being on eBay. I am a bid-sniper. I wait until the last moment to submit my bid. This prevents anyone else watching the items from outbidding me. As the items auction timer counts down the last 20 minutes or so, it will count down second by second for you to watch. Have your bid placed into the bid window and when 10 seconds are remaining, place your bid as quick as you can! [JWR Adds: There is bid sniping software available. I recommend using it.] Your bid will get locked in and no one else will really have a chance to do anything about it, unless they have done the same thing or previously placed a much higher bid.
Another thing to be aware of is that people instinctively place bids in predictable increments. So lets say an item is going for $40. People will bid in increments of $5. So if you see that people have already bid on it, you can be sure that you will need to bid $46, or $51 to secure the auction. When you are bid sniping keep this in mind. You need to bid slightly over the next predictable bid.
Some auctions are normal auctions where they start at one dollar and bidding is open for a few days or up to ten days. When the auction is complete, regardless of what the highest bid is, the highest bidder wins the auction. Other auctions have a reserve, which means that a minimum bid must be made to meet the reserve requirement before the auction can be won. I ignore any auctions with a reserve because I don’t look for fair prices, I look for great deals! Other auctions say “Buy now for x or Make an offer” Don’t be afraid to make an offer to people. Just by them creating the auction in this way you know they are looking to make a sale. I once bought two $300 [body armor] plate carriers of great quality by making an offer of $50 for each vest.
Good luck hunting for your survival gear. Search for anything and everything. I always check eBay before I make any purchase, from clothes to gun scopes. You should too!
JWR Replies: I too find a few bargains on eBay, particularly old AC/DC vacuum tube AM-Shortwave radios for my collection, field gear, holsters, magazine pouches, and knives. By patiently waiting for “sleeper” auctions, I’ve accumulated a substantial pile of Cold Steel, Benchmade, and Columbia River Knife and Tool (CRKT) folding knives, both for eventual barter and as a hedge on inflation. A few years ago, I was still able to find some bargains on pre-1965 non-numismatic “junk” silver coins, but unfortunately those days are gone, since there is presently such strong interest in precious metals. And sadly, eBay’s management went Politically Correct and banned sales of firearms magazines and many gun parts such as barrels. For those, I use auction sites like GunBroker.com and AuctionArms.