Undercutting

[Dilu_Bakari]

So the inferno Horn usually sells for 1.2 mil at the least. So people are so desperate for gil you will undercut someone and the idiots follow along with this clown, to go as low as 900k? Where they do that at?

[Coatl]

Why not buy their horn and resell for profit?

[Lemuria]

Welcome to economy 101.

It's called competition. It's existed since the dawn of time and you see examples of it everywhere you look. If a competitor can't get a better product, prices will come down so they can guarantee sales. Since all the 'products' in FFXI remain pretty constant, aside from HQ items, there will always be undercutting to a good extent as people want to guarantee that THEIR item is the one which sells, rather than their competition.

After all, what's better? Putting an item up at full 'normal' price, and waiting up to a few days for a sale, or lowering the price a little and guaranteeing a quick sale?

[Coatl]

After all, what's better? Putting an item up at full 'normal' price, and waiting up to a few days for a sale, or lowering the price a little and guaranteeing a quick sale?

I mean, it really depends. If I'm not sure the item will sell because I judge its value to be intangible, then I'll undercut to get rid of it. But if someone undercuts me for things that require materials from crafts and such, I will just remove my item from the shop and wait for theirs to sell before putting mine back up. I have 59 other items selling and I'm not going to trip because one or four of them were undercut.

@OP:
All I can say is, calm down Sparky! You don't need that 1.2m tomorrow or the next day.

[hqdm]

After all, what's better? Putting an item up at full 'normal' price, and waiting up to a few days for a sale, or lowering the price a little and guaranteeing a quick sale?

You have a valid point, as do most of the people in this thread, but this is a bit of a misconception in regards to expensive/slow moving items with a wide profit margin.
From a seller's perspective, I wanna milk as much as I can out of a single item, and so I'll resort to minimal undercuts to preserve the price. It's fine if you don't.
But doing 25k, 50k undercuts on an item that moves so slowly doesn't guarantee a sale, because people will invariably check their retainers & see the undercut before the item moves, and then undercut you by 5g or whatever.


It should be expected that you'll get undercut, regardless of what you undercut by, on items that basically print money.

Thavnairian Onions are a good example. They've dived about 500k in the last week or two on my server because some bright bozos keep trying to do "quick sale" undercuts.
The material cost to produce an onion lies around 170k assuming 14k soil (plus excessive growth time).
I won't complain (too much, heh) if you do, because it's still massively profitable to sell an onion at x-25k, but it's devaluing the time (plot & player) required to generate it unnecessarily, because with a margin that wide coupled with slow rate of sale, people will happily still undercut you. There's no advantage gained when an item meets those criteria.

For faster moving items, sure. It's certainly a feasible tactic.

[KingOfAbyss]

I wanna milk as much as I can out of a single item, and so I'll resort to minimal undercuts to preserve the price.

Greed Rules.

Leave it to humans to manage a market, and this is what you end up with. SE must be laughing.

When an Item with the upmost rarity comes in, the first one that will put it make 'the price' <-- rules by Greed. Don't start with yeah but the economy, the system, the % of drop, nah: pure Greed.

And then: preserve the price. There is no set price, except what SE put down the item window if you are selling it to NPCs.

No one would complain if it was managed by SE, and then everyone would end up having the same stuff as it should since it's an MMO.

So now there is a disparity and give some a little advantage over others, seeing that with time, we will get the loot.

I will always put the price I want, judging how others have put theirs, so that I can have the Gil I want from it and be satisfied.

You can then buy it and resell higher, I don't care, we'll both end up being happy.

[Synestr]

Instant gratification. It's stupid but rules the mind of the majority. Things like FC demi III's Savage X materia's, Horns, all sell well and for a good amount of cash, till you get the impatient that happened across something worth some gil and want's it RIGHT NOW!!!!

The things I sell I do so on a consistent basis and am pretty aware of their ups and downs, weekend sales etc.. If i put up some demi's at what they should go for and jacktard comes behind me and undercuts me that's ok, Mine will sell, even if it takes a day or so. I'm not hard up for the cash so I can wait.

But OP, yea it sucks, but let their stuff disappear so your's can sell or as suggested, buy their and repost, to maintain price and make a profit.

[Seoulstar]

So let me get this straight..it's ok to oversell something at a ridiculous price..but once someone undercuts you, it's a bad thing?

[Synestr]

So let me get this straight..it's ok to oversell something at a ridiculous price..but once someone undercuts you, it's a bad thing?

I will agree to a point. Some prices for some things are just...wtf. Map minions come to mind. Other things though, that have gone through a "standardization" period, such as ores, ingots, jewlrey etc., what is the point of marking it down a few thousand just to get the quick sale?

Price and acceptability of price is perception. i70 HQ pieces were the cat's meow back in the day easily netting a few mil not to mention the melding of said pieces. Today they go for much, much less.

Same with the current state, new crafting stuff is wanted. SO supply and demand kick in.

WHat OP is talking about is a drop, so yea there might be an issue with that. As mentioned things get ran more so and abundance of rare items become available. That is different though from farmed, gathered, crafted items.

I am sure there have been times where you have gotten something good to sell and were like yea!!!! Then put it up, and a day later its there because 7 a$$hats decreased the asking price by 5 each. If not then lucky you. It happens and is annoying at times.

In general undercutting is unwelcome and bad form.

[Typhon66]

I will agree to a point. Some prices for some things are just...wtf. Map minions come to mind. Other things though, that have gone through a "standardization" period, such as ores, ingots, jewlrey etc., what is the point of marking it down a few thousand just to get the quick sale?

Why you ask undercut on items with "standard" prices? To crash the market of course. Now you probably ask, why would i want to do something like that? If i do that, an prices fall, then nobody makes money right? Wrong.