Home Forums Hunting & Shooting The Lefty Forum Quite a few nice customs on GB

No affiliation; somebody must be liquidating a collection. Some nice rifles if you are into r700 and synthetic.

https://www.gunbroker.com/item/1045882813

https://www.gunbroker.com/item/1045845832

And a bunch more …

Including a lefty 9.3x62...

Some really nice ones there. Also some ridiculous and pointless wildcats.

I spend quite a bit of time perusing Different Sellers on Gunbroker. I've done so daily for about 13 years. Many of these companies take firearms on consignment. I won't post names on an open forums, but IMHO, just about any time you see "NR" bidders or those that have one or two purchasers although different on similar auctions by the same company, you can bet your bottom dollar they are shill bidders. Once I see that, I quit bidding.

ya!

GWB

Yep...

That 7-08 looks heavy...

Model 70:

https://www.gunbroker.com/item/1046423612

just about any time you see "NR" bidders or those that have one or two purchasers although different on similar auctions by the same company, you can bet your bottom dollar they are shill bidders. Once I see that, I quit bidding.

ya!

GWB[/quote]


Agreed, it’s been more than a few times I’m bidding or watching an item when an “NR” shows up, they typically drive the price to ridiculous money and/or I’ll see the item again with a note, “relisted, non-paying bidder”. Alpha Hotels

You figure out what you want to pay and don’t go any higher. There are very few things on GunBroker that haven’t ever sold before (or something essentially the same). Even for custom rifles. So, you should have some idea of what it is worth before you start bidding.

If they want to try to shill you, then they are not selling the rifle. If a rifle is getting close to my “no more than X value”, then I will often wait until the last minute to put in my next bid. Partly this is to keep myself from getting caught up in the thrill of the chase and stay disciplined, but also to wear out the patience of someone who doesn’t really want the rifle. I am certain that there are some idiots who use shills to try to squeeze an extra $25 out of a $500 rifle, but if the ultimate goal is to sell guns, then it’s terrible return on investment.

I’m perhaps less skeptical of NR buyers because I was one not too long ago. I only started really using Gunbroker back in November (although I originally started my account in 2020 to buy some ammo). If many people don’t like the idea of bidding against an NR buyer, then maybe that explains some of the deals I got? I wonder if I would be better off staying NR?

What is NR?

I’ve been watching left hand actions of all types on GB for years now. Pricing has skyrocketed. I was surprised to see the bass pro link someone shared with a 338 for $600. There were two factory blued models on GB for months on end in the high teens.

NR is Not Rated. A buyer who is so new that he has no feedback. Some dealers allegedly won’t sell to NR bidders, but I haven’t encountered that personally. In the various gun forums, you will often find people bitching about how they were bidding on a great deal, but stopped because some NR bidder kept outbidding them. They assume that the NR bidder is an account belonging to the seller, but the odds that some new person can also recognize a good deal seems pretty reasonable to me.

As far as prices skyrocketing, there are a ton of things on GB - particularly niche or higher end things - that aren’t really priced to sell. I almost never pay attention to the listed price. When I first joined I was all impressed with some of the asking prices. I remember thinking, “wow! My pre-64 .30-30 is nicer than that one which is listed at $2750!” Then I realized that no one was ever going to buy that overpriced thing. The only thing you can do is look at what has actually sold before and try to make comparisons.

Edit - I am very patient. I have watched some guns for months before the seller finally removes the reserve and prices it realistically. In many cases, it still goes for more than I want to pay, but less than the older price. In other cases, I have seen items go for more than the price at which they sat for months after the price is initially lowered.