Offering Bitcoin for Goods. Best Practices?

[Glasswalker]

Hey, I'm interested in posting an offer, I would like to buy some electronics, and would like to offer a fixed bitcoin price for them. If anyone wants to take me up on it, great.

The problem is, I don't know what the best practice to execute the trade is. Since bitcoin is irreversible, unlike paypal or another transaction method. How do I know that I'm not going to send the BTC, and never get the product. Unless I wait until it's received before sending, but then... How does the other party know they aren't going to send the product and never see the BTC?

Or do people do a 50% deal, 50% of BTC once they see proof of shipment (tracking number), and the other 50% upon reciept.

Because the electronics I want (a particular synthesizer) is likely not going to be easy to just stumble on on one of the btc classifieds sites, I will likely need to post it to a large forum, and hope someone will notice and take me up on the offer. So I won't have the benefit that a buyer does to filter for only "trusted" sellers and such...

Any suggestions? (are there services to help with this?) Or is BTC just not mature enough for this level of transaction yet?

I know as a "business" the common practice is to receive full payment first, then send the goods. But those are established businesses carrying a reputation, and with proven ability to follow through (and if they fail to they heavily impact their reputation and future business). But some random individual coming on the boards has no real risk to themselves if they decide to screw someone on a transaction.

I wouldn't mind if it were a 1BTC transaction, but I'm looking at more like 30BTC, which has taken me about a month+ to mine at expense of power mining gear for myself. So I don't want to loose it on a bad transaction.

I do want to support bitcoin though, and would like to try and use it to buy/sell tangible goods because I think that will help bolster the strength of the economy, (in the end BTC must be useful for buying selling goods/services or it becomes valueless, having money that carries value on an exchange simply for the sake of being exchanged can't work longterm).

Thanks in advance for any advice/suggestions.

(by the way, I'm looking to purchase a Korg Kaossilator Pro, used is fine, but must be in good working condition and include all cables. Offering 30BTC for it, which I think is a fair price. At today's exchange it's a bit low than the current "ebay" price, but I think the ebay price is high anyway, since they retail new for as low as $350USD right now. And if BTC climbs back to $12+ which I believe it will, then 30BTC will be a fantastic price for this synth).

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[ovidiusoft]

Either both parties trust eachother, or they use an escrow service for a small fee. Search the forums, you will find some.

[latestfan]

I am interested in selling goods via bitcoin including synths and electronics, but I am looking for a higher than eBay price for my goods in bitcoin due to the higher risk involved in the currency. If the exchange rate is $7.80 to 1 btc now, I would also look to sell at a lower exchange rate peg and hope to leverage a greater return through the currency appreciation. Without a premium at this point for adopting the currency, what incentive is there to use bitcoin over eBay?

[greyhawk]

I am interested in selling goods via bitcoin including synths and electronics, but I am looking for a higher than eBay price for my goods in bitcoin due to the higher risk involved in the currency. If the exchange rate is $7.80 to 1 btc now, I would also look to sell at a lower exchange rate peg and hope to leverage a greater return through the currency appreciation. Without a premium at this point for adopting the currency, what incentive is there to use bitcoin over eBay?

None.

[Stephen Gornick]

Without a premium at this point for adopting the currency, what incentive is there to use bitcoin over eBay?

What incentive is there to accept bitcoin over *PayPal*, did you mean to write?

For a U.S. seller, PayPal takes 2.9% + $0.30 of the payment.  for a $100 sale, that means just $96.80 would be received.  Accepting $100 worth of bitcoin at the current bid, then trading them on an exchange would cost less than 1%, and you would get about $99.00 USD as a result.

$99.00 beats $96.80 by most all measures.