why do sellers change asking price to sold after a sale?
 

this has probably been answered before, and maybe it's a dumb question, but why do sellers change the sale price to sold on their items once the deal is done?

as a research nerd, i always like to have as much info as possible. so that sale price would be helpful.

thanks in advance for your responses :)

We have discussed this countless times, and I will never understand it, IMO it's obnoxious.

is there a benefit to doing that as a seller? aside from just not wanting others to know what the sale price was?

What's the usual rationale we hear, protecting privacy or something?

When I sell a card for the asking price, I always happily display this information, to help promote the idea that people should stop trying to get a discount from my listed prices.

When I sell at a discount to asking, I usually do not display that information because I don't want people to get the idea that they can get a discount from my asking prices.

It's as simple as that.

About as well said as can be. Irritating to not leave the asking price, not necessarily the sell price. And makes no logical sense to me.

I have always been tempted to do so to hide the fact that I may have sold something too cheaply.

Brian - the bashful seller that still hasn't changed a sold price to 'Sold' or just a $ sign

Right, if I took something off I wouldn't go out of my way to advertise it either, but neither would I eliminate all pricing information and substitute $SOLD.

It’s generally understood that in markets like this the transaction information is property of the buyer and therefore up to him to disclose terms.

Because they can (for whatever reasons they choose).

1) the listed price is often not what it actually sold at. Often it traded. Often I took the OBO option.

2) the sales data for 99% of cards sold here on the BST is easily found by clicking eBay’s sold results to get a much larger data set. Unique stuff isn’t sold here all that often. I just don’t see any meaningful purpose.

3) because some people don’t really read and will continue to send emails even after I’ve said it’s sold or traded or gone, but if “$SOLD” is written over the price they can’t miss it because that’s the part people read.

Agreed. Leave the asking price shown and indicate "No longer available".

I think most sellers dont actually know why they do it. They just follow what theyve seen and it becomes a chain reaction for most sellers to follow suit.

i think i've sold maybe 3 cards since joining the site, and this is why i did it. lack of knowledge, lack of experience, etc.

There is a dollar starting bid auction section. Get over there and sell something.:D

A related question: why do sellers bump their threads only to comment "SOLD" when you can simply edit the original post? :confused:

That is the one that makes me go WTF and makes no sense to do.

:D

the lack of a clue how to post pictures really hurts my chances

Whenever you want to learn email me and I will walk you through it.:)

I'm glad you finally said WTF :D

I've done it a few times, and other times haven't. If it's a knocked down price, you may get a bunch of emails like "Had I known you were going down to $425 on that card. . . . " Those are annoying too.

My attitude is a negotiation is a private matter unless both sides want to disclose it.

I'm also sure many people on the board have done transactions before where the details of which weren't publiclly disclosed. Don't see how this is offensive to anyone. Private negotiations remain private until the parties decide otherwise.

BTW, why would you have that much interest in the sale price of a card you had no interest buying in the first place?

But I imagine who marked $SOLD be upset if a buyer then posted the price?

No, as seller I wouldn't care if buyer disclosed it. Not at all.

The offer price, and any reductions made on the forum, were already "disclosed." This has nothing to do with keeping a private sale private. Nobody else on the board even knows who bought the damn card. The question is, having already posted the price, why go out of your way to delete it?

Agree!!

Not in the slightest. They can post screencaps of our email conversations about it if they want. I don’t get why anyone would care in the slightest; how many cards are sold on the BST for which there is no pricing information available and people who didn’t buy it really have an interest in knowing? A handful?

+1

Then why are you deleting it?

I just assume that it's people not wanting the IRS to see what transactions they should now be taxed on.

I will chime in here as this is something I do.. here is my rationale:

At first, I had no idea how to sell a card, so I just did it because everyone else does.

now I continue for the following reasons.
1) it makes it clear the card is sold. I have left prices up (and note sold in the message) and continue to get messages on cards.

2) It protects the buyer from others knowing who bought it. If someone sends a "PM sent" message and the card is sold shortly thereafter, it can be known who bought the card and at what price.

3) Sometimes I may take a lower price and do not want that to be the base case assumption for other cards in the listing

There are definitely ways to accomplish all of these and also leave the sale price, but I just find this easier and preferable for me. I am not sure why this would annoy anyone.

I am annoyed by the unwritten rule that no one can comment on on a seller's cards/prices. IMO there is a nefarious/dishonest intent behind this, but I abide by it.

I covered this topic just a bit in my 'Collectorisms' thread... :)

25. The War of the Discloses
The eternal, ongoing debate of whether or not the price of a card sold in the B/S/T section should be kept in the thread for posterity’s sake, or removed by the seller.

519. Fool’s Sold
Adding a new post to your own thread (that everyone is now forced to read) to declare that the card has been sold, instead of simply editing the title to reflect this fact.

915. Cost Suppressant (refer to #25)
The deliberate removal of the asking price of a card in a thread after it has been sold.

See also: Sticker Stifler - a seller who chooses to edit out the price of his card to make it now read something to the effect of “$SOLD.”

See also: Dollarsense - the argument that leaving the sales price in for everyone to see is beneficial to the entire collecting community.

See also: Stetsman - someone who abides by the principal of leaving his asking price in and unchanged following a sale.

Darren, 915 is brilliant.

I always replace the price with SOLD as well as in the title, no particular reason other than that's my preference. If you're that interested and want to know what the card sold for PM me, I'll tell you, which I have done many times for members.

WTF +1 on bumping in the reply section instead of the title when the card is sold.

Ryan, what type of comments would you want to make on B/S/T listings?

I would say thank you...but the pessimistic implication would be that the other two just plain suck. :cool:

Hahaha. Not at all, just the one stood out. :)

I don't think the IRS has the resources to be looking for online sales and to try to connect them to someone without a social security number being available with the transaction, unless Leon is going to start sending in 1099s for any card that sells for over $600.

Perhaps in some cases, the seller doesn't want to disclose the sale price because there are those the saw the "offer to sale" price and will be able to gauge how much a seller will negotiate the next time something is offered for sale.

I'm not afraid to send an offer to a seller. Worst case is that they say no or there's further negotiation. What's poor form is when people just completely low ball the seller, or (and I know I'm going to get an earful about this next comment) is when someone has a really nice sale price and someone buys it to flip it quick to make a few bucks. In my opinion, if someone has a nice price on it, let it go to another board member that can appreciate the card and hold on to it because they truly want it as part of their collection - ok, bring it on, let's hear the reasoning about capitalism and "if one person didn't do it, then someone else would do it".

Because I don't know if the buyer is cool with me disclosing it. I assume the ball is in his court.

I have sold countless cards on here to see them reappear back on here for sale. One buyer on here has resold easily 90% of the cards he has bought from me on here. Sometimes they get relisted on here fairly quickly and sometimes he holds them before reselling them on here.

The 2 biggest cards I bought on this forum was resold to 2 different members and then later put back up for sale on here again. As members we pass around a lot of cards amongst ourselves.:D:D

I could have sworn this was a written rule somewhere…

Buy more cards
 

As I said years ago if you want to know more prices, buy more cards...Jerry

Agree that it is a super douchy move. If one has the price up to begin with, just leave it and write SOLD next to it. Nobody needs to know if they discounted 50% or not.

Yes- This

Im curious what the dishonest intent is here?

I hate when sellers do that. I sell, inevitably it sells for a different number than my list price, and I don’t go out of my way to revise the number. But I don’t delete the original list.

It was discussed here (the word "discussed" being used very loosely)...
https://www.net54baseball.com/showth...t=interference

I think "super douchy" is a bit strong here. Seller can do whatever he wants.

I realize that it is a totally different marketplace but long ago AH's would not show realized prices after their auctions closed. Now we get all sold card prices days following the close of the auction. Still amazed at some of the prices fetched for 2nd and 3rd tier vintage HOF'ers. It is hard to adjust to the new price structure.

I do it for this reason alone. I've never overthought it beyond that. If I sell something on craigslist I delete the ad. Does that frustrate people too? :)

I do think it's annoying that people bump BST threads for no reason other than "nice card, glws" but whatever. Not a big deal.