Ensuring to win the item: lead time

BID HISTORY


Pred02,

The timing of the bid is of some importance, primarily to avoid a bidding war. But towards the end of the auction, the main concern is still the same as that at the beginning of the auction – the bid amount.

In your example, no one bid after you – they only bid more.

With that said, I think you'll find recommendations for lead-time to be between 5 and 12 seconds - all of which are good.

Here is the recommendation from the FAQs:
http://www.auctionsniper.com/faqbasics.aspx#basics13



Happy New Year



P.S. Consider bidding in "odd" amounts instead of even dollar and 5-dollar amounts.

Hi,
Pred02, if I were you, and if this item were important enough, and if your maximum bid is "fuzzy" (i.e. you're the type of person, like me, who second guesses himself when he's outbid), then....

I WOULD NOT RELY ON AS! I'm serious. If you are able to bid manually at that hour (using two screens, one to view time remaining, one to have your bid ready to click& confirm), then BID MANUALLY. There's often wobble in AS lead times. Experienced snipers know this. Even with 8 second lead times I've had bids placed like 25 seconds before close.

I'm saying this as a big AS fan. I almost always use AS. But if it seems important enough, like a once-a-year opportunity (and again, on items where my valuation is "fuzzy"), instead I watch the item in the last few minutes and make a manual bid, and sometimes rebid if I'm outbid. (I managed once to rebid with about 9 seconds left--I had a rebid window set up in advance).

BTW, re Smart's comments on a 12 second lead time being OK: I'd say that people should assume they CAN be outbid manually with even 12 to 15 seconds left, let alone 20 seconds or more. I realize this is sort of a long running, uh, debate here. My 2 cents worth is, on several occasions I've manually rebid with less than 12 seconds left. It's not that hard.