Totally. The whole sniping thing is a little... meh. I don?t know. Sneaky. I get that. But it does cover two things pretty well in my opinion.
1) People have a tendency to get attached after being the high bidder. They?ve already won it in their minds. Then five minutes from the end, their $8K max bid gets outbid. They say ?screw it, I want this.? Let?s make it 9. Hell, maybe they still aren?t the high bidder. So make it 10...
2) Here?s me. 5 minutes before the auction ends. I bid $8300. I?m the high bidder. The guy above bids me out. I rebid. He rebids. I have no self control. I have money to spend. So now here I?m spending $11K.
By waiting until the last minute (or 30 seconds really), the competition doesn?t have time to rebid and neither do I. So I don?t risk letting the little devil on my shoulder take control. And hopefully I win at a good price.
Obviously, the risk is some annoying glitch like being ask to login again... such was the case today. I?m just telling myself that the winning bidder had a max bid of $12K. Otherwise I?ll be staring at the ceiling all night. Damn that engine looked clean.
Bring a trailer does it right. Every time the bid gets raised, the time is extended by 2 minutes.