Did you buy it?
Yes and no.
There's a little gamesmanship that's been going on with the owner.
I'm pretty sure that he had a shill bidder to jack up the price.
I'm trying to get a fair price from him, if not, I'm turning him in to the ebay police.
If he had a shill bidder who jacked up the price, that's irrelevant if the buyer didn't go through with the sale, isn't it? Your bid that you made would be the highest bid in play, else he would be talking to the highest existing bidder, right?
I think you should stick to your old offer.
I agree. Unless he can prove the other bidder is genuine (and he may feel he doesn't have to), then as your's was the last kosher bid, it has to be honoured. If it falls through, there must be other bikes out there.
My point is that it doesn't even matter if the other high bidder was genuine and the offer fell through or if he was just a shill. If Scrap offered what he thought was a fair price for the bike and he was the second-highest bidder, then his bid is the highest bid now.
Well, that's where the problem lies you see.
I was already onto the fact that a shill bidder was in play, so I bid higher that I was genuinely willing to pay, just to prove that shenanigans were going on. The blue book value for this bike is $1790 in excellent condition. It's not in perfect condition so I'd guestimate its blue book value to be about $1500. The winning bid was $2100.
When faced with a non-payer, ebay has a procedure to deal with non-payers. He completely ignored that procedure and gave me a "second chance offer" which was $2075, a ridiculously high price.
I think it's time for me to show this scumbag my hand and threaten to turn over all the info I have to law enforcement, unless he plays by my rules.