Offers? - are people just trying to avoid a bidding war? (2024)

FAQs

Why do people make offers instead of bidding on eBay? ›

As you theorized, potential buyers often make offers that are higher than the opening bid, because they hope to get the item cheaper that way than if the auction ran its full time with regular bidding. Thus, many of these offers are legitimate. There are also offers from potential scammers.

To avoid a bidding war in this housing market, make the seller forget about any other offer. When your offer stands out from the rest, they won't care about what else is coming their way. The easiest way to avoid a bidding war is to give the best offer upfront.

Yes, it's unethical but when money is involved anything can be justified to the unscrupulous. Believe it or not, bidding wars are a relatively new creation. Although, bidding wars may have been around for longer, they were not widely implemented because of how unethical they were once perceived.

Include an Escalation Clause

A strong offer could include an escalation clause by agreeing to increase your offer if a higher bid comes from another buyer. However, make sure to include a cap on the total amount you will pay. This avoids spending more than you want.

I know it's a seller's prerogative what to do, but it would be common courtesy to at least decline my offer if they feel we wouldn't be able to come to an agreement. Sitting on my Offer until time expires is downright rude, and it makes me never want to do any kind of business with that seller.

Sellers are not required to reply to offers from buyers. If your offer isn't accepted, you can always try to send a higher offer. The seller has the right to refuse or ignore any offers.

A home seller can always reject an offer that they don't think reflects the value of their real property. Even if the offer is above the listing price, the seller has the legal right to deny the offer and accept a higher sale price.

Buyers employ two main strategies to determine how much is reasonable. In a bidding war, some buyers offer between 1% – 3% over asking to make their offers stand out. Other buyers rely on their real estate agent to gather intel on the other bids on the property, then top the highest bid by a few thousand dollars.

Sellers can accept the “best” offer; they can inform all potential purchasers that other offers are “on the table”; they can “counter” one offer while putting the other offers to the side awaiting a decision on the counter-offer; or they can “counter” one offer and reject the others.

Can you make offers on two houses at once? ›

Yes, you are allowed to put offers on multiple houses in California. In fact, it's a common strategy for succeeding in a competitive real estate market, and it doesn't get much more competitive than California.

Instead, unpaid items are usually returned to the original consignor, put into a future auction, or sold privately. Often, these backup plans result in a significant loss for the seller—and the winning bidder is obligated to make it up to them.

There Are Also Other Ways to Avoid a Bidding War

One way you can show the buyer you are serious is by having less contingencies in your contract. Some other methods include making a cash offer, getting prequalified for a home loan before you make an offer, and looking for properties outside of hotspots.

They don't want to buy the item at all, but they think it's cool or interesting. They don't want to buy the item at all, and they are casing your listing. Many watchers are sellers of rival products and are simply checking out the competition to see how their listings perform.

Adding best offer to your listing increases your chances of a successful sale. You can set your preferences to automatically accept or decline offers of a certain amount, and use the counteroffer feature to negotiate with prospective buyers.

The Offer to buyers feature, which can be enabled in Seller Hub can help you target buyers already interested in your items and to close the sale faster. This feature is available for Fixed price listings only.

My thought is they find sellers are more willing to go lower when confronted personally via message than an offer system. Sometimes I accept low ball offers if an item hasn't been sold for 3+ months. So I guess they wanna try their luck and see if they can haggle the price.