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Lawrence Kestenbaum (potifos)
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So you want to sell me something? On Ebay, I'm mostly looking for politics and government resources to expand and support my web site, The Political Graveyard. Material, especially state legislative manuals, which lists and profiles elected officials, provides election returns for state or federal offices, or provides definitive historical overview of counties or district boundaries, are of particular interest. I also occasionally buy books relating to the history of cemeteries, and sometimes I buy items of interest to other members of my family. Some examples of the types of titles I'm watching for:
What specifically I would buy depends, of course, on the price asked and on what is already in my collection. Condition (other than missing pages, active mildew, or anything else which would make the book unusable) makes much less difference to me. Signed copies and the like are not worth extra to me; I am not an autograph collector. These items are somewhat obscure, but they do come up occasionally at a wide variety of prices, and I am a patient buyer. If the price is $5 or less, I am probably interested. If the price is $20 or more, it had better be something pretty special, or I am not likely to be interested. However, for a significant number of worthwhile items available in one lot, or the Historical Atlas of U.S. Congressional Districts, I would go a good deal higher. I pay for purchases with PayPal. Note that my PayPal payments come directly from my PayPal balance or bank account, so the seller doesn't lose a percentage to credit card charges. Our home mailbox is too small for packages, and there is no safe place out of the weather to leave them. Therefore, all items should be shipped to my P.O. Box address. For shipping, I prefer Media Mail (the old Book Rate). I prefer to waive postal insurance on packages costing $50 or less. Unless a book is unusually large or heavy, the total for shipping for a single item should be no more than about $5.00. When high shipping charges are stated which raise the price of an item beyond my guidelines, I don't bid on it. If shipping terms are not stated, before bidding, I write to the seller to ask. I am very grateful to the many Ebay sellers who have helped make my collection and my web site possible. So you want to bid against me? Feel free! If you exceed my maximum bid, you're welcome to the item. I promise I won't come back and bid the price up again. I suppose this might be seen as a betrayal of the fine principles of competitive auction bidding that have made Ebay a great trading forum, but I myself am not interested in getting into bidding wars. I rarely bid on items that have any prior bids; and if someone else bids against me, they usually win. Therefore, as a general rule, I win an auction because nobody else bids. Since this strategy doesn't work with reserve price auctions, I don't bid on those. There are millions of people on Ebay, but it seems only a few of us are interested in decades-old state legislative directories.
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