The key to Ebay is patience. Sellers WANT you to get caught up in some frenzy of being competitive and outbidding the next guy. Don't get married to some item and bid past the vaule of the item. You WILL see the same or similar item in a 1-2 weeks usually and be able to snag it with an opening bid.

Ebay just flows like that. 6 guys all bidding something up double its value one week and no interest in similar item the next. Go figure.

Don't fall for the idea that you don't want to lose an item for the sake of 50 cents. Make the maximum bid you want to go and leave it alone till the end of the auction.

I was looking for a vintage desert water bag. They are continually offered on Ebay so are not really rare. I saw generally what they went for with the stupid exceptions when some nuts bid them up to $45! I bid for probably 3 weeks. One max bid. I finally got one for $18. Sure I coulda got one for $50 I guess but why not be patient?

Where I see the same guy bidding on the same type of item I wonder what the hell he's doing, wanting to buy a bunch of the same thing to resell or what. Sometimes I think they just makes several bids and figure they'll win one and if they win 2 that's OK too. I don't know.

I personally never bid if the seller has less than a 98% performance factor and I read the feedback include any negatives. A 99% positive feedback on 6,000 sales is pretty damn safe.