Some Tips for Buying Ham Radio Equipment on Ebay. 1. Look for the items you want on eHam and qrz classifieds first. eBay is a sellers’ market and bidding can …

1. Look for the items you want on eHam and qrz classifieds first. eBay is a sellers’ market and bidding can drive prices higher than a reasonable classifieds seller might ask. Good deals are available on eHam and qrz. Rarely does eBay give you a “miracle deal.”

2. When you join Ebay, use your “My eBay” page as your base of operations. After finding items you are interested in, select them for watching in My eBay and they will be listed there along with other summary information such as time remaining in the auction and the current high bid.

3. If you don’t already have a PayPal account, open one. Become a verified PayPal user. Only use PayPal for payments on eBay. Other payment methods are more risky. Never use Western Union. By using Paypal, a seller automatically gets your address for shipping an item if you win an auction.

4. Make use of the Search facility to find items you are interested in. Remember to try alternative search keywords and maybe even common misspellings or misclassifications. For example, a speaker mic may be listed as a speaker microphone or mistakenly listed as just a microphone. Restrict you search to Consumer Electronics which contains Ham Radio as a sub-category.

5. Read an item’s description very carefully. If it is sketchy, be careful. Does it state that the unit is working? Is it untested or described as “as is?” Don’t assume the unit works. Note if it includes any accessories. For example, an old HT up for auction may not include an antenna or may not have a tone board for accessing repeaters. Often manuals aren’t included. A sloppy, uninformative description can be a red flag. However, if someone is selling a dead parent’s equipment, they may not know much about the equipment, let alone be able to test whether or not it is working properly.

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