Auction style posts in For Sale section a la ocau forums style

[funkymonkey]

Is it possible to post up for sale items and set out the following:

I provide pics, a immediate sale price, and a reserve price and an end date. People then offer bids for the item (obviously higer than the bid price). At the end of the date specified, I sell the item to the person with the highest bid. Of course if sumone offers the immediate sale price, then the item is sold immediately and the thread closed.

People can post up questions on the item as well.

What do you guys reckon?

[dale]

sounds cool

[sammus]

this might put pressure on sau, who do not want to be responsible for items/cash.

would be similar to ebay.com/sold.com.au etc? may become quite complicated.

is it worth it?

[funkymonkey]

how's it any different to just selling an item... all it is is a different way for people to agree on a price to pay for an item... at the end of the day, the person is still selling the same old thing and the buyer is buying just as he usually does. Coming to the price agreement on the other hand is what this is all about.

It dosen't make SAU any more liable than it is right now for people buying and selling over the For Sale section. It dosen't require any modifications to the forum, nor does it need a new section.

head over to OCAU's for sale section... you'll see what I mean. Its very organised and orderly.

Its not like ebay, coz nothing is hidden. The reserve price, the quick sale price and the bids are all out in the open. Its jsut a bit more organised than a guy selling something, then someone else going, i'll give you 50 bux for it and sumone else goin i'll give you 60 bux for it.

Its actually better, coz people can't gve no price and rely on people to come up with figures for em, and if they get a shitty figure they can't whinge about it coz people already will know how much the seller wants for it as a minimum.

[sammus]

ok, that sounds good.

one more thing - would the seller be locked in? like if he/she were to get an outside offer which was better. i guess this will only apply to parts and misc. stuff... not whole cars.

[EnricoPalazzo]

it wouldnt work cos there needs to be a syncronised countdown clock, or else u cant sneak bids in at the end, and ur not sure on when the auction exactlty ends.

[funkymonkey]

well usually on OCAU, there' no such thing as last minute sneak bids, and if there's fierce bidding towards the end the auction goes on tiill someone backs out.

The seller is not obligated to sell to the highest bidder, he can sell it outside, he needs to give the bidders a bit of notice tho, or state clearly at the start if he will finish the bidding early if someone offers him a deal outside of the bidding (which encourages bidders to put their best bid in first so the seller dosen't sell outside).