If I am high...

The short answer is no.

The long answer is there is one very strange circumstance where eBay will let you do this, but only up to the bid increment amount. And only if you placed a bid on eBay before sniping.

Really though you shouldn't ever bid on eBay. Some people like to dabble by putting their first bid there hoping nobody else will bid and they'll end up saving 25 cents in snipe fees.

I can send you auction after auction where you can look at the bid history and that cost them $10-15 on a $40 item.

In the long run you will win a lot more, for much less by sniping 100% of the time.

...I find it nearly always attracts attention when an item has a bid on it, tending to drive up the price. I think people tend to think something might be a worthwhile purchase if someone else is interested in it - for whatever reason. Nice for sellers not so nice for bargain hunters.

I'll place a bid on eBay to take something off "Buy It Now" status. I've saved a few bucks doing that. I do agree that people tend to think somethings worthwhile if someone else has bid on it. I call it the "He Must Know SOMETHING Syndrome".

One other rare situation where I will place a bid on ebay (before a snipe) is when an item has a very low opening bid; no reserve; no bids placed yet; and several days have passed since the auction started.

Why?

Remember: a seller can cancel an auction at any time for no reason at all if no bids have been placed.

The scenario goes somthing like this: A seller might be watching his item very closely for a several days and see that it has not attracted much attention or interest. They then might just decided they don't wan't to risk selling it for $1.13 at the last minute because they offered it for so little so they then cancel the auction to relist at a higher opening, sell some other way, or put back in the curio cabinet.

By placing an opening bid AT the opening bid of, say, 25 cents, you "force" the seller to comit to seeing the aucition through. You can then set an AS snipe to guarantee victory when the auction ends.

You do risk attracting some attention with your opening bid; but if you really want the item it's the only way to insure that it will still be there six seconds before the scheduled close.

I've been on both ends of this situation before, as a seller and a buyer, so it does happen more than occasionally!

--Jonathan

...if you place the minimum opening bid of say, 25 cents and an AS snipe of $1, and no one else ever bids on it, will your snipe outbid you and raise the ending price to $1? Or will that just raise your proxy bid?

Thanx!
Skeeter

PS - Thanks to everyone for all the helpful replies!

The basic rule is that you can't snipe yourself. If your bid of 25 cents is enough to win the auction, your later bid of $1.00 will have no effect on the final price. You'll wind up paying two bits.