A Lesson in eBay
April 5, 2003
by Chelan David

Have you ever wondered how out of control the rabid bidders on eBay are? I decided to conduct an experiment and find out. I placed a crisp $5 bill for sale on eBay to calculate how high the bidding would go for a piece of paper with a picture of Abe Lincoln on it.

eBay offers so many options on how to sell an item it can be overwhelming. I finally found the category I wanted Abe to be listed under which was stunningly accurate: Paper Money: US: Small Size Notes. Wondering how many people actually place paper money for sale on eBay I decided to spice up the title to attract more attention for my auction. I went with "Five Dollar Bill Y’All" figuring that I might at least draw some gullible Bizkit-heads.

I started the minimum bid at 99 cents with the following description:

Five Dollar Bill for sale! Features a solemn, bearded Abraham Lincoln on the front and the Lincoln Memorial on the back. Bill is green and white. Bill is in excellent condition and has only been used a couple of times. Series 1999. This note is legal tender for all debts, public and private. THIS IS NOT COUNTERFEIT! Inspirational message on back includes "In God We Trust."

Pleased with my J. Peterman-like writing I flipped off the computer sure I would have a bid by the morning.

When I logged onto the eBay site the next day I was in for a rude awakening. There were 21 hits but not a soul had placed a bid. The second day there were 28 hits but still no bids. Days three and four brought in a paltry two hits each day and still no one had pulled the trigger.

On day five I received my first bid – for a grand total of 99 cents. My frustration grew after day six as I was at 43 hits and still only the minimum bid had been placed.

With the auction ending on Sunday I left the house so I wouldn’t constantly be logging onto eBay for updates. When I came home that night I was sure that addicted bidders squinting for fabulous deals had marked my auction and were ready to pounce on it as the time wound down. I envisioned a bidding frenzy with some sad sap saddled with a $5 bill they had bid $10 for in the excitement of the moment.

Alas, the eBayer’s ended up valuing Abe at two Georges plus change. The winning bid was for $2.27 with a total of 73 hits. The eBay community proved not to be as foolish as I had surmised and I ended up losing a couple of bucks on my grand experiment.

I guess if anything, I learned that I'm the foolish one and came away with a valuable lesson learned. Online bargain hunters have a concept of value that is usually more closely associated with brick and mortar stores. They just have many more products available to them which makes it seem like uncontrolled chaos.

The silver lining of my experiment was that I had the pleasure to meet Russ, a spray painter from Philadelphia, online. Curious about the currency bargain hunter, I contacted him after the sale and started a correspondence. In his own words, he is as "busy as a one legged man in an ass kicking contest," but finds the time to spend about 25 hours a week on eBay.

Apparently shopping for money can be fairly lucrative. Recently he was able to buy a $50 bill for $37.75. As Russ points out, in this time of economic uncertainty it is certainly comforting to know that free money is just a click away.

(Chelan David is a volunteer staff writer for 2 Walls Webzine)