Camper Trailers

The higher value is obviously the price we would like to get, the lower value being the bare minimum we are willing to go to. Generally like advertising in the newspaper it's expected people will offer less than the asking price - my apologies as I should have probably put "or nearest offer" in there somewhere.
This is the first run of the ad and in the end if there is no interest we'll be keeping it, we need the cash and that's just one avenue of getting it, honestly I'm not even sure if we're expecting too much or not.
If I didn't have any ethics I wouldn't have mentioned the ebay ad.

A bit harsh No 1, I don't see anything unethical - as outa bounds says she made full disclosure. Maybe you don't understand the way E-Bay works, or are those silly blue glasses finally affecting the way you see things.

Tessa

Thanks Tessa. I find ebay great as long as you start at a reasonable price.

I could have started it at any price on ebay with a reserve of what I wanted, but didn't see much point in doing that - pay an extra $10 to make people think you're offering them a bargain & not disclosing what price you're really after.

Member No. 1 did have a good point though & I can understand where he's coming from - if I advertised it for $22k in one place & $25k in another then that certainly is double standards to some extent.

but its not just the different prices...
what if some one on Ebay bids a higher price than 25..lets say 27k but only a few minutes ealier you recieved and accepted a price of 25k via from the trader ad... what do you think the high bidder would be thinking of you if you had sold it for a cheaper price...

its up for auction and until its passed in at auction, it should not be offered anywhere else.

You have a good point there, I never considered someone would pay more than $25k because of the buy it now price listed there. But you are correct because once there is a bid then the buy it now feature disappears (I think?).

I did however think of putting a disclaimer in the ebay ad saying that it's advertised elsewhere & the ad may be canceled if it's sold by other means - a lot of people tend to do this. I probably will end up editing the ad and put that in even if just so that anyone who has it on their watch list is aware of the fact.

But it's not so bad, once a bid is placed on ebay I would pretty much consider the camper sold (no reserve), and would thus be removing the ad on this website.
Likewise if a firm offer was made off this website I would end the ebay auction early, re-listing if it happened to fall thorough for some reason.

Ethically it looks fine to me, I haven't looked at the ebay ad but it is very common there for people to state that the item is advertised elsewhere and might be withdrawn from ebay if it sells before the end of the auction. All interested parties, through ebay and here know exactly what the situation is and if they have concerns they need not make an ofer.

As for sturdy and basic, I would recommend Cavalier, though they are a bit hard for one person to pull over, after that they are fine and it's dead easy with two.

Done - I've put the notice in on the ebay ad.

Greydemon and Outa
Quote
"I did however think of putting a disclaimer in the ebay ad saying that it's advertised elsewhere & the ad may be canceled if it's sold by other means"...?

this is not the way to conduct an auction...if its up for auction it should go to highest bidder...it can of course be withdrawn prior to auction but once its in it should be left there for the auction to run its course...you are protected by your reserve........

put yourself in this hypothetical ...you want a Pro Hart...see one one EBay at a bargain price no reserve, you are highest bidder and willing to go up 5000 and maybe more if need be...i walk into gallery and offer 100 more than your price...trader takes the deal...then remembers to withdraw (if he can..i dont know the rules here) the item from the auction...what would you think

I have seen some people cancel and ebay auction after somebody has placed a bid - or they haven't canceled it properly instead just editing and saying "this item has been sold do not bid" sorry for any inconvenience.

Not sure you quite understand what I mean though. The auction on ebay would in no way be canceled once somebody places a bid (I don't think you can do that without a very valid reason). Once a bid is placed at 22,000 the camper is as good as sold and I would take off any other advertising or inform any interested parties that it's sold. For example I would select the sold option on this website and if I got any inquiries I would then say either that it's sold or direct people to the ebay auction if they are really interested.

Think about advertising in a newspaper, the ad is out there regardless if someone has already called you up and you have agreed to sell to them for whatever price. The next call you get the buyer could be offering your asking price or more if they really wont it but you are bound to the original caller. So obviously any further phone enquiries would get the "sorry already sold" line.

extracted from Ebay policies

"Refusing to honour a winning bid by not following through with a successful transaction is a policy violation when committed by both sellers and bidders."

we can only believe you ...right?

Yes once a bid is placed on ebay it is sold to that bidder if nobody else bids.

You said it - the bid on ebay has to be honored, but if there are no bids the auction can be canceled and one of the reasons you can tick during that process is "item is no longer available" or something to that effect. It is not canceling as such but ending it early so you still incur any advertising fees you paid.

I have done this once before, advertised some lego blocks, it was still the first day with no bids yet when I decided to give it away to my local childcare instead. So I ended the auction early.

You can't do that once a bid is placed.

You mean to say you have never advertised something in more than one place? Eg posted a not at your local shop and advertised in the paper at the same time?

advertising in 2 differing places is not the issue

its the auction bit V a private ad that is the issue

if at auction it should stay where it is..the auction.....

I will take your word for it that an item cannot be withdrawn if a bid is made...but what if a buyer from your trader ad closes the deal, and you have a bid or bids that you didnt know about...then i guess the deal from the trader falls thru...or does it especially if he offers more? ..:))))

As I said I guess we will have to believe you'd do the right thing.....

No worries, I wasn't sure what you meant by " we can only believe you" before.

Obviously it would make good sense to make sure there are no bids on ebay before closing other deals, so all potential buyers would have to be made aware of that. And I guess that could be detrimental to me in price negotiations with non ebay buyers.

It has potential to get complicated I guess. I do have broadband internet and I'm at home most of the time looking after the littlies so checking for bids and ending the auction early isn't a real problem.

Like you say if I got an offer for $24k and at the same time somebody bid $22k on ebay it would be hard to decide which way to go. The right thing to do would be to honor the 22k bid and I would most certainly do that.

Explore Oz members would already be aware of the ebay auction, if anything going through ebay may provide that little bit more transaction security. Obviously should I advertise in the local paper also I would have to alert interested people to the ebay auction. In that case interstate buyers would have an unfair disadvantage at having to factor in freight costs.

I understand your point and you can only trust that I would do the right thing so I'll stop here before I start repeating things over and over, getting carried away.

I'll certainly be looking at that sort of option, seems that these days you can buy bolt on campers for a 6 x 4 trailer relatively cheaply.

I think I know of a few necessities so far:
Mozzie & bug proof sleeping area.
some sort of under cover area for cooking
offroad ability - we don't seem to do serious four wheel driving but that could change - hubby would love to get into it more, I'm a bit of a chicken.
storage isn't generally an issue.
water storage is very important - at least 60L, and not having all the water in one huge tank is an advantage in my opinion.
kitchen sink is nice but a low round bucket probably works just as well.
hard floor vs soft floor, well that's a debate in it's own.

When we retire (yes that's a fair while away) we're planning on travelling around Oz most of the time, hubby is really set on having a Cruizer Ute for some reason by then so whatever trailer we get will probably be upgraded in 15yrs time.

We plan on going to the upcoming NSW camping show to have a look at the multitudes of designs out there.

One thing to be said though is once you've had a taste of a good thing it will proablby be hard to adapt to a "lower standard" if you want to call it that.

No I shouldn't do it in the forum but we can supply for around $7,000 for off road, heavy duty.

Thanks - I'll definitely be keeping this post as a reference so may follow up when (or if) the adventure sells.

Thanks Cammo that was a really helpful response.
You brought up a few things that I didn't think of and a few taken for granted.

The treg hitch I took for granted. Hubby has also said that he would like to get electric brakes next time. The point about not getting a battery system in the camper is good to consider. I think hubby would prefer to run the fridge on the camper and I probably would due to easier access. We currently have the 60L Engel on the front & an Evakool eski in the back of the car for drinks. The roof rack would be fine for bikes, but hubby won't let me put my MTB on there standing up (wind resistance) & I'm not laying it down to get damaged (it's an expensive bike) so I don't take it :(. Kids bikes are really small & fit inside the campers storage for now :)

I do of course realize that not everyone attends all the shows, it's a good start though to see different styles and features in real life and on-line resources will certainly be a great tool otherwise.

You have a good point about usage too, no point having a you beaut trailer if you won't be able to use it to it's full potential. Originally we were living in Townsville and hubby was on a 8 & 6 fifo roster. But now he's in a Mon - Fri job and our youngest has started preschool so we're becoming a bit more like ordinary people going away when we can take hols or during shool hols or long weekends :)

That Tambo looks pretty good.