Just wondering if anyone can give any hints, insight on purchasing fishing equipment like depthfinders etc on Ebay. Any advice, good or bad experiences, things to look for etc, would be appreciated. Not a big ebayer… 
I buy a lot of stuff off eBay. Probably more than I should. 
The one thing I can recommend is checking up on the sellers feedback. You can get a decent idea of the credibility that way. If they have some negative feedback, I’d be a bit leary.
Honestly if you looking for a place for electronics, I’d check with Wade Keuhl from Jolly Ann Marine. That have about the best deals you can find. 
You can also contact people on eBay who have bought from the seller in the past.
Still, it’s always buyer beware.
Perch, I recently purchased a humminbird 787 sonar/gps combo on ebay from a seller by the name of something like gsbp12, he has a link on his items to his store Neanderthal Hunters. I highly recommend this seller as he went above and beyond being he was out of stock of the one I wanted and sold me the navionics bundle installed at no extra cost with no shipping. If you want his exact seller name please pm me.
I’d also like to note to be very careful, in my searches I found tons and tons of fradulent ebay auctions (on fishing stuff, especially big ticket fishfinders), usually you can figure them out pretty easy, look at the seller’s history do they sell things like this? Is the item actually listed in the correct catagory? normally they aren’t, beware there are lots of scammers out there, beware of comminications that come outside of ebay, tricky things like email the seller a question to an email adderess, you should be able to ask any questions “through” ebay.
Two basic rules I live by, if it sounds too good to be true it probably is, and secondly if something just doesn’t seem right, it probably isn’t. Don’t go by seller feedback alone, lots of times I’ve seen people with stellar feedback get their account hijacked from these internet theives, people don’t look at the past sales they get blind sided by what they think is the deal of the year, and get ripped off.
Take a little time, do a little looking, before bidding, most scammers are pretty obvious.
I’m sure there are good deals to be had, I bet you can fidn some good deals locally too either through the classified adds here or even craig’slist. I know I have found some really great deals in the stores too
For me most Ebay auctions I’ve won are small items, basically I figure if I got taken it wouldn’t be for much, I’d say most of my wins were under $20. I’d rather buy big ticket items, in person from a store, or a place I trust, I trust Wade and Jolly ann marine too
feedback, I don’t buy anything over 20 bucks if the seller doesn’t have at least 20 positives, and if there are any negatives, there better be a good reason for them. The other thing to check with feedback, is how long they have been a registered user. If they have 20 positive feedback over a year or more, ok. But, if they have 20 positive feedback over a period of less than 2 months and they’ve been selling 2 dollar items, be wary.
I also buy a lot of stuff on ebay and never been burned. Ebay takes a lot of action to ensure transactions are safe and you buy what is described. People value positive feedback and with a couple negatives they are banned from ebay. That not to say some smart scammers can’t make it work.
As for tips on ebay, here is the number one tip to go by when buying if you want to get a good deal. Bid on the item you want to see if someone has a proxy bid in place. If you are not the high bidder, keep bidding small increments until you become the high bidder (unless it is more than you want to pay for the item). Once you are the high bidder, WAIT. All good deals are won with about 3 seconds left. I open my clock on my computer which displays the seconds. I then refresh the ebay screen to see exactly how many minutes and seconds are left on the auction. You can then determine the exact second that auction ends. Next, make sure you are signed in to ebay. When there is about minute left (less time left if you have a fast internet connection) enter your bid and click Bid. This will take you to the confirmation screen. Stay on this screen until there are about 3 to 5 seconds left on the auction (you know when this is because we previously determined auction end time using the computer clock). When the time is about out, click confirm bid and cross your fingers. It sounds complicated, but do it a couple times and you will be an ebay master. I have boughten a half dozen brand new St Croix Avids using this method and never paid over $70. Not too mention all of the other “Victories” I have had on ebay.
Good luck and Good bidding
Justin
Generally speaking E-bay is a much better forum for the seller than for the buyer. It is amazing how much people are willing to bid on used items, sight unseen. In my opinion too much. On top of that the buyer takes all the risk. When I want to buy an item the first thing I do is perform an “Advanced Search”, then click the button for completed autions. Then you can see the price range you can expect to pay for that item. If you just look at current items the info will not help as often the high bids come at the last minute of the auction. Compare those actual sell prices to the cost of new and decide if you want to pay that much. If so keep bidding on current items up to the lower range of the historical sell price. This all assumes that the item is common enough for it to have a history and that you are not in a big hurry to make the buy. Most often when I look at the added benefits of buying new like warranties, return policies, convienience, pre-examination, secure transaction etc. etc I find myself asking why would I want to pay 70%+ of the new price.
The seller advantage is because there’s far too many people on ebay now. Back in the early days, bidding tactics were not widely known and nailing GREAT deals was much easier. There’s so much seller competition now and the buying audience is so large that getting everyone who’s looking to stop bidding at a “wow” price is impossible. Many don’t care about the final cost either. I recently sold a Polaris Sportsman 90 and it should’ve closed for about $900-950.00, according to advanced search researching. I got $1225.00 because 2 people were close to my location and wanted that machine PERIOD! The bidding war was on and it finally ended about $300.00 higher than it should have.
The trick to ebay is to know what it’s worth to you and throw it out there. Whether you do it in the last 3days or the last 3 seconds, stick to your limits and hope for the best. All the research advice here is good, I’ve been ebaying since early ’98, and so far, being “cautiously aggressive” has yielded me 0 negative purchases. I’ve always received what I paid for, exactly the way I expected to get it.
I’ve bought lots from eBay, but am very selective on what I buy. I would never consider buying electronics, even if the seller had 100% positive feedback. I’ve bought 3 units from Wade at Jolly Ann over the last couple years and you will never find a better retailer. He’s answered my standard 50 questions on each unit before I order, his prices are competitive with or better than others, and he ships faster than anywhere else. It has never taken more than 2 days to receive an order. I’ve never had an issue with the stuff I’ve ordered, but I would be willing to be that Wade would stand behind anything you order from him and help you resolve any issues right away. IMO, Jolly Ann is a top notch retailer and is one of the reasons this site is what it is.
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