People in my area don't literally line up down the street 20 minutes before garage sales start to inform sellers and pay retail prices for items. I'm out of the garage sale game, but would not feel bad finding deal while deal hunting. Would anyone inform Goodwill that maybe they're missing out on money by charging a flat rate of $0.49 for games or the local game store that Bases Loaded 4 isn't a dollar bin NES game?
I'm not sure how to embed a video and this is the only YouTube version I could find for it but this is a woman that tried to sell a Fabergei spider on Pawn Stars for $2000 and Rick instead offered her $15,000 for it. She ended up arguing about the price and asked for more after that.
<-- snip video -->
Actually, I use to watch American Pickers (back when I had cable) and those two guys were always behaving this way. Of course, in their case, they were asking to dig through peoples barns and out buildings and then asking the owners for a price. If they would say "I'll take $10" but they new it was worth considerable more, they'd always bump the asking price up considerably and would basically say, "I try to get it at half price."
I know he scenario is completely different, since yard sellers are initiating the sellers, where in pawn shops and picking the buyer is initiating the sell. Still, something about trying to be a little more reasonable still seems like a good thing.
Again, and to re-clarify, I don't think it's unethical to buy an item at the sellers asking price. Still, that doesn't mean the someone can't have a conscience that says "what would you want them to do to you, if the table was flipped?"
Anyway, good discussions. This is going well so far.
I'm not sure how to embed a video and this is the only YouTube version I could find for it but this is a woman that tried to sell a Fabergei spider on Pawn Stars for $2000 and Rick instead offered her $15,000 for it. She ended up arguing about the price and asked for more after that.
<-- snip video -->
Actually, I use to watch American Pickers (back when I had cable) and those two guys were always behaving this way. Of course, in their case, they were asking to dig through peoples barns and out buildings and then asking the owners for a price. If they would say "I'll take $10" but they new it was worth considerable more, they'd always bump the asking price up considerably and would basically say, "I try to get it at half price."
I know he scenario is completely different, since yard sellers are initiating the sellers, where in pawn shops and picking the buyer is initiating the sell. Still, something about trying to be a little more reasonable still seems like a good thing.
Again, and to re-clarify, I don't think it's unethical to buy an item at the sellers asking price. Still, that doesn't mean the someone can't have a conscience that says "what would you want them to do to you, if the table was flipped?"
Anyway, good discussions. This is going well so far.
American Pickers seem to be good dudes so they are probably not a very good example.
Also, often times they run into old-timers who have never sold anything so they have to give decent offers in order to grab the stuff.
I would have no heart burn about buying an expensive game grossly underpriced at a yard sale. It's the sellers responsibility to know the values of the items that they are selling. Most of the time it's just junk to them that is taking up space and they are more than happy to get rid of it.
Suppose you were browsing eBay and you came across a seller who had just posted a bunch of BIN listings for NES games at $10 each and one happened to be Dinosaur Peak. Would you message the seller and let him know how underpriced the listing was, or would you click the "Buy It Now" button and pay for the game ASAP? I know what I would do.
You aren't responsible for the seller being a dumbass. If they care so little about what they are selling that they can't do a 10 second ebay search that's not my problem.
You aren't responsible for the seller being a dumbass. If they care so little about what they are selling that they can't do a 10 second ebay search that's not my problem.
x2
Folks want to feel good about a deal, but at the same time, they rant when they see ebay prices at flea markets. You can't have it both ways.
You aren't responsible for the seller being a dumbass. If they care so little about what they are selling that they can't do a 10 second ebay search that's not my problem.
x2
Folks want to feel good about a deal, but at the same time, they rant when they see ebay prices at flea markets. You can't have it both ways.
The same people who are not okay with not informing a seller at a garage sale, but are just fine with the same practice at a retail establishment.
There's not really any point in paying more than asking price unless you want to generate "good will" (perhaps making it worth the seller's while to bring out more to purchase). No sense in being an educator either and sabotaging your own deals; otherwise you might as well be buying games "straight-up"-- online or through retro stores.
Ok, after a discussion in the Finders Keepers thread, I thought I'd post a general discussion post regarding Yard Saling. Specifically, I was wondering what the general thoughts and possible consensus of many is on how to handle those hyper-rare items that you stumble upon that are marked ridiculously lower than their actual price since the seller is completely ignorant of what they have.
Of course, there is also a wide middle ground, to. You could find a game for $5 that goes for $10 on eBay. That's a good deal but you may not feel it's even worth your time since, after all, you are at a yard sale.
But, what if that is a tagged $5 game worth $20... $50... $100... $1,000 or, heck, $10,000!
So, I'm asking, do you have a personal rule where you feel like the deal that you may find is so much a "steal" that you can't in good conscience buy the item at the sticker price. Furthermore, if you were to see a $5 item worth, say $100, would you be honest about it's value and say "Here's $50"? If it were really a "Holy Grail" item you could never afford, would you tell them about the item or would you just say "Hey this is a bit nicer than you think it is, here is [insert amount of all of the money in your pocket]?"
As a matter of ethics, I think if they price something low, that's there choice and you've done nothing wrong. How ever, there is a little grey area between ethical and moral choices. Morally, I'd have a tough time doing that.
Anyway, I'm curious about you guys thoughts and if you have any personal, general guidelines on these type of situations.
today for example picked up a Vita lot . She asked 50 then bumped it up to 60 , but when i saw the 32 GB card , I handed over 60 and she said thank you so much . Easily 250 of value games are all the good ones , Never say nothing . It bites ya in the ass , I hate the "collectors" in my area who tell people value so another collector doesn't get it .
Most pizza companies make a pizza for a buck fifty or less. Sell for twelve. You don`t see them saying, hey for years weve over-charged, heres "insert deal". Personal collection, or resell gain.
I find people who get stuff for free try to flip it but each their own, but dispicable. Only people Im in anyway jealous of is the people with the all white clean game rooms, those are dope. Ive gotten freebies from a stadium events owner.. Ive offered and sent a few things on here I don`t need to someone who may need it. The other day someone was happy with me, over-paid my paypal because they were stoked. I gifted them back what they over-paid. I could always use the cash, i got a kid on the way. But i like to help, too.
Its just the game. The second you open your mouth and say hey you undervalued this, is when it bites you. Closed mouths dont get fed, but huge mouths get screwed.
I don't believe in karma, and I'm not really a full supporter of laissez faire economics, but in this case, I'm going to buy the item and walk away without any guilt. So long as what I'm getting is exactly what's advertised, and I'm paying them with honest money they agreed to, I think it's fair game. I think we as a society have already decided we want people to be able to stumble into lucky situations anyway, like the lucky person who found an action comics #1 in a wall or, heck, the entire existence of the lottery.
The reason people go to garage sales is for cheap items, Why drive across town in hopes of finding a game, then offering what you could have just bought it on Ebay with a return policy for? I have purchased tons of Games and systems at garage sales over the years, and believe me, many times the systems are broken, and CD/DVD based games are often scratched. It's not stuff that is worth retail value. I have only found 2 cart based games that I could not get to work, but you never know. I bought a copy of BattleToads that had the board for NFL inside of it, If I had given the lady $15-$20 for it I would have been screwed...
There have been times that I throw in some extra cash, but only if something is extremely rare, and I just tell them it's because I really wanted one of the games badly, I never say that they are worth anything.
I made the mistake once of telling a guy that I buy games at garage sales because I hate how much they had gone up in stores at that time(2008). The next week I ran into him buying games at garage sales, and he told me that when I left his sale he had looked games up on ebay and was going to start selling games... Some of the things I have seen in his ebay sales since then have made me extremely upset with myself for telling him that.
...I bought a copy of BattleToads that had the board for NFL inside of it, If I had given the lady $15-$20 for it I would have been screwed...
I cannot stress enough how important it is to check the boards, people. Even garage sales aren't safe these days.
Amen! That was 5 years ago, and I got it for $1 if I remember correctly. I dont bother checking boards at that price, but if things are more expensive I always check boards. I even keep a set of bits in my car usually.
I found a CIB copy of Metal Warriors at my local game shop. It was during the first three months of their opening and he had no idea what he had (thought it was Mech-Warrior!). I was interested in helping him get his business started and was looking to form a good relationship at the store, so I told him what it was and it's actual value. We worked out a deal involving some trades and a decent amount of cash. I still walked away feeling like it was a good deal. Now, I'm one of his favorite customers and is go to repairman for anything Nintendo. I get store credit and he still gives me crazy deals on everything and even holds onto rare or mint condition stuff for me to check out. In the end it was well worth it. I've easily made back the extra money I payed for it in subsequent deals with him and I made a friend. Their business is thriving BTW.
I found a CIB copy of Metal Warriors at my local game shop. It was during the first three months of their opening and he had no idea what he had (thought it was Mech-Warrior!). I was interested in helping him get his business started and was looking to form a good relationship at the store, so I told him what it was and it's actual value. We worked out a deal involving some trades and a decent amount of cash. I still walked away feeling like it was a good deal. Now, I'm one of his favorite customers and is go to repairman for anything Nintendo. I get store credit and he still gives me crazy deals on everything and even holds onto rare or mint condition stuff for me to check out. In the end it was well worth it. I've easily made back the extra money I payed for it in subsequent deals with him and I made a friend. Their business is thriving BTW.
I wish it worked that way for me, I helped a store when it opened here in town. The owner had owned another store in 2001 and was still going by those prices, not using the internet. I told him several times that he needed to start looking up prices, because I was afraid that he would go out of business fast. Once he started looking up prices he started to see what stuff was worth, and he got really greedy. He started a policy that he would not give more than $1 for classic games, but then he would sell the ones he got on ebay to hide the fact that he was not giving fair trade value. He just kept afew cheap NES games in store to give the impression that they werent worth much, and to show that he accepted them. When customers started asking him why he didnt have any good NES/SNES games in stock anymore he would tell them that afew other local collectors and I were "hoarding" all the good games when in reality they were all being sold on his ebay store.
If I could go back in time I would have never helped him out.
Yeah, my guy is a pretty cool dude. He tends to treat everybody fairly, to the point that I worry about him being taken advantage of. I guess he makes sure he gets more than what he pays for things without gouging too much. Funny, one of his stipulations when I bought Metal Warriors from him was that I wouldn't sell it on eBay. He likes to keep it local, in hopes that he might see it again and have another chance to sell it!
It was a yard sale and the guy didn't seem to have any gaming stuff, so I asked. He went inside and came out with this. His asking price wasn't worth the time he spent digging it up, so I had to offer a bit more.
Yeah, my guy is a pretty cool dude. He tends to treat everybody fairly, to the point that I worry about him being taken advantage of. I guess he makes sure he gets more than what he pays for things without gouging too much. Funny, one of his stipulations when I bought Metal Warriors from him was that I wouldn't sell it on eBay. He likes to keep it local, in hopes that he might see it again and have another chance to sell it!
It sounds like you have a great guy, we had a guy like that here when I first moved into the area. Great guy, Software engineer that got laid off and bulit a point of sale for a videogame store, but was unable to sell it, so he started a store. Always good on the hookups, and it kept his buyers loyal. Sadly his company hired him back(Good for him) and the store got sold to a kid whos parents bought it for him as a HS Graduation present... It went out of business in 6 months. I was sad to see the original owners legacy go down like that.
Comments
I once bought EVO for 75 cents, does that answer your question?
Depends on when you bought it
If you're going to ruin every good deal for yourself, why are you going to yard sales, anyway?
So he can log onto NA later with epic Looser Weepers stories?
I'm not sure how to embed a video and this is the only YouTube version I could find for it but this is a woman that tried to sell a Fabergei spider on Pawn Stars for $2000 and Rick instead offered her $15,000 for it. She ended up arguing about the price and asked for more after that.
<-- snip video -->
Actually, I use to watch American Pickers (back when I had cable) and those two guys were always behaving this way. Of course, in their case, they were asking to dig through peoples barns and out buildings and then asking the owners for a price. If they would say "I'll take $10" but they new it was worth considerable more, they'd always bump the asking price up considerably and would basically say, "I try to get it at half price."
I know he scenario is completely different, since yard sellers are initiating the sellers, where in pawn shops and picking the buyer is initiating the sell. Still, something about trying to be a little more reasonable still seems like a good thing.
Again, and to re-clarify, I don't think it's unethical to buy an item at the sellers asking price. Still, that doesn't mean the someone can't have a conscience that says "what would you want them to do to you, if the table was flipped?"
Anyway, good discussions. This is going well so far.
I once bought EVO for 75 cents, does that answer your question?
Depends on when you bought it
Haha, good point, good point.
Let's just say it was recent enough to be a solid score.
I'm not sure how to embed a video and this is the only YouTube version I could find for it but this is a woman that tried to sell a Fabergei spider on Pawn Stars for $2000 and Rick instead offered her $15,000 for it. She ended up arguing about the price and asked for more after that.
<-- snip video -->
Actually, I use to watch American Pickers (back when I had cable) and those two guys were always behaving this way. Of course, in their case, they were asking to dig through peoples barns and out buildings and then asking the owners for a price. If they would say "I'll take $10" but they new it was worth considerable more, they'd always bump the asking price up considerably and would basically say, "I try to get it at half price."
I know he scenario is completely different, since yard sellers are initiating the sellers, where in pawn shops and picking the buyer is initiating the sell. Still, something about trying to be a little more reasonable still seems like a good thing.
Again, and to re-clarify, I don't think it's unethical to buy an item at the sellers asking price. Still, that doesn't mean the someone can't have a conscience that says "what would you want them to do to you, if the table was flipped?"
Anyway, good discussions. This is going well so far.
American Pickers seem to be good dudes so they are probably not a very good example.
Also, often times they run into old-timers who have never sold anything so they have to give decent offers in order to grab the stuff.
Suppose you were browsing eBay and you came across a seller who had just posted a bunch of BIN listings for NES games at $10 each and one happened to be Dinosaur Peak. Would you message the seller and let him know how underpriced the listing was, or would you click the "Buy It Now" button and pay for the game ASAP? I know what I would do.
You aren't responsible for the seller being a dumbass. If they care so little about what they are selling that they can't do a 10 second ebay search that's not my problem.
x2
Folks want to feel good about a deal, but at the same time, they rant when they see ebay prices at flea markets. You can't have it both ways.
You aren't responsible for the seller being a dumbass. If they care so little about what they are selling that they can't do a 10 second ebay search that's not my problem.
x2
Folks want to feel good about a deal, but at the same time, they rant when they see ebay prices at flea markets. You can't have it both ways.
The same people who are not okay with not informing a seller at a garage sale, but are just fine with the same practice at a retail establishment.
Now, if some old lady is selling a SE for 10$ and you try to get it for 5$, then I will step in and inform the old lady of the value.
Ok, after a discussion in the Finders Keepers thread, I thought I'd post a general discussion post regarding Yard Saling. Specifically, I was wondering what the general thoughts and possible consensus of many is on how to handle those hyper-rare items that you stumble upon that are marked ridiculously lower than their actual price since the seller is completely ignorant of what they have.
Of course, there is also a wide middle ground, to. You could find a game for $5 that goes for $10 on eBay. That's a good deal but you may not feel it's even worth your time since, after all, you are at a yard sale.
But, what if that is a tagged $5 game worth $20... $50... $100... $1,000 or, heck, $10,000!
So, I'm asking, do you have a personal rule where you feel like the deal that you may find is so much a "steal" that you can't in good conscience buy the item at the sticker price. Furthermore, if you were to see a $5 item worth, say $100, would you be honest about it's value and say "Here's $50"? If it were really a "Holy Grail" item you could never afford, would you tell them about the item or would you just say "Hey this is a bit nicer than you think it is, here is [insert amount of all of the money in your pocket]?"
As a matter of ethics, I think if they price something low, that's there choice and you've done nothing wrong. How ever, there is a little grey area between ethical and moral choices. Morally, I'd have a tough time doing that.
Anyway, I'm curious about you guys thoughts and if you have any personal, general guidelines on these type of situations.
today for example picked up a Vita lot . She asked 50 then bumped it up to 60 , but when i saw the 32 GB card , I handed over 60 and she said thank you so much . Easily 250 of value games are all the good ones , Never say nothing . It bites ya in the ass , I hate the "collectors" in my area who tell people value so another collector doesn't get it .
Most pizza companies make a pizza for a buck fifty or less. Sell for twelve. You don`t see them saying, hey for years weve over-charged, heres "insert deal". Personal collection, or resell gain.
I find people who get stuff for free try to flip it but each their own, but dispicable. Only people Im in anyway jealous of is the people with the all white clean game rooms, those are dope. Ive gotten freebies from a stadium events owner.. Ive offered and sent a few things on here I don`t need to someone who may need it. The other day someone was happy with me, over-paid my paypal because they were stoked. I gifted them back what they over-paid. I could always use the cash, i got a kid on the way. But i like to help, too.
Its just the game. The second you open your mouth and say hey you undervalued this, is when it bites you. Closed mouths dont get fed, but huge mouths get screwed.
hell no, buy it and run.
Now, if some old lady is selling a SE for 10$ and you try to get it for 5$, then I will step in and inform the old lady of the value.
I get it out of principle but kinda silly dollar wise. You can have SE for $7990 off, but if you ask for $7995 off then I won't stand for it, haha.
There have been times that I throw in some extra cash, but only if something is extremely rare, and I just tell them it's because I really wanted one of the games badly, I never say that they are worth anything.
I made the mistake once of telling a guy that I buy games at garage sales because I hate how much they had gone up in stores at that time(2008). The next week I ran into him buying games at garage sales, and he told me that when I left his sale he had looked games up on ebay and was going to start selling games... Some of the things I have seen in his ebay sales since then have made me extremely upset with myself for telling him that.
...I bought a copy of BattleToads that had the board for NFL inside of it, If I had given the lady $15-$20 for it I would have been screwed...
I cannot stress enough how important it is to check the boards, people. Even garage sales aren't safe these days.
...I bought a copy of BattleToads that had the board for NFL inside of it, If I had given the lady $15-$20 for it I would have been screwed...
I cannot stress enough how important it is to check the boards, people. Even garage sales aren't safe these days.
Amen! That was 5 years ago, and I got it for $1 if I remember correctly. I dont bother checking boards at that price, but if things are more expensive I always check boards. I even keep a set of bits in my car usually.
hell no, buy it and run.
Now, if some old lady is selling a SE for 10$ and you try to get it for 5$, then I will step in and inform the old lady of the value.
I get it out of principle but kinda silly dollar wise. You can have SE for $7990 off, but if you ask for $7995 off then I won't stand for it, haha.
Its all about the principle of greed for me. If the dude bought it for 10$, i would have passed it on. But that is my opinion.
I found a CIB copy of Metal Warriors at my local game shop. It was during the first three months of their opening and he had no idea what he had (thought it was Mech-Warrior!). I was interested in helping him get his business started and was looking to form a good relationship at the store, so I told him what it was and it's actual value. We worked out a deal involving some trades and a decent amount of cash. I still walked away feeling like it was a good deal. Now, I'm one of his favorite customers and is go to repairman for anything Nintendo. I get store credit and he still gives me crazy deals on everything and even holds onto rare or mint condition stuff for me to check out. In the end it was well worth it. I've easily made back the extra money I payed for it in subsequent deals with him and I made a friend. Their business is thriving BTW.
I wish it worked that way for me, I helped a store when it opened here in town. The owner had owned another store in 2001 and was still going by those prices, not using the internet. I told him several times that he needed to start looking up prices, because I was afraid that he would go out of business fast. Once he started looking up prices he started to see what stuff was worth, and he got really greedy. He started a policy that he would not give more than $1 for classic games, but then he would sell the ones he got on ebay to hide the fact that he was not giving fair trade value. He just kept afew cheap NES games in store to give the impression that they werent worth much, and to show that he accepted them. When customers started asking him why he didnt have any good NES/SNES games in stock anymore he would tell them that afew other local collectors and I were "hoarding" all the good games when in reality they were all being sold on his ebay store.
If I could go back in time I would have never helped him out.
Yeah, my guy is a pretty cool dude. He tends to treat everybody fairly, to the point that I worry about him being taken advantage of. I guess he makes sure he gets more than what he pays for things without gouging too much. Funny, one of his stipulations when I bought Metal Warriors from him was that I wouldn't sell it on eBay. He likes to keep it local, in hopes that he might see it again and have another chance to sell it!
It was a yard sale and the guy didn't seem to have any gaming stuff, so I asked. He went inside and came out with this. His asking price wasn't worth the time he spent digging it up, so I had to offer a bit more.
Alleyway
Baseball
Castlevania Adventure
Tennis
Tetris
Tetris
Original clamshell
@Sinnbox
Yeah, my guy is a pretty cool dude. He tends to treat everybody fairly, to the point that I worry about him being taken advantage of. I guess he makes sure he gets more than what he pays for things without gouging too much. Funny, one of his stipulations when I bought Metal Warriors from him was that I wouldn't sell it on eBay. He likes to keep it local, in hopes that he might see it again and have another chance to sell it!
It sounds like you have a great guy, we had a guy like that here when I first moved into the area. Great guy, Software engineer that got laid off and bulit a point of sale for a videogame store, but was unable to sell it, so he started a store. Always good on the hookups, and it kept his buyers loyal. Sadly his company hired him back(Good for him) and the store got sold to a kid whos parents bought it for him as a HS Graduation present... It went out of business in 6 months. I was sad to see the original owners legacy go down like that.