Penny Auction Sites - Deal of the Century or Scam of the Century?

Penny auctions sites have really stepped up their marketing during the past few months. Since swoopo.com, formerly telebid.com, launched in the United States in August 2008, it has grown its user base tremendously. It's so big, in fact, that people find the site to be too crowded at points. Since its success has become noticed, there are now several clone sites doing the same thing.

A penny auction site offers a product starting at 1 cent. Each bid increases the cost by a set amount somewhere around 1-5 cents. The catch is that each bid costs you somewhere between 50 cents to a $1 each. A time begins counting down at the start of each auction and the winner is the person with the highest bid when time runs out. The catch on this is that each bid adds a small amount of time to the clock extending the possible range for another person to place a higher bid. If you win you only pay the price of the product plus the amount you have into the cost of your bids. This can work out to be a great deal for the winner. The losers are often upset and frustrated after wasting their time and money chasing a product that someone else got to purchase.

These have the potential to steal you blind if you're not careful. Place each bid knowing that it doesn't just cost you 1 cent. It really costs you 50 cents to $1. Know when you start how much you're willing to pay for the product you're bidding on and make sure you have enough bids purchased in advance to pay that amount. You will not have time during the auction to go and purchase bids to outbid someone else before the auction ends on most sites.

A user forum has started at pennyauctionwatch.com to weed out the good penny auction sites from the bad ones. It would likely be beneficial to you to check out this site before placing a bid on any penny auction site. They will hopefully give you honest opinions on you chances of winning and if the site is being run without inciting the bid using bots or extending the time for no reason on you. Can you get a great deal at sites that aren't scamming you? Yes, you can but can you also lose hundreds or even thousands and get nothing also. Have fun, educate yourself about the product you are trying to buy, decide what you are willing to pay for it before you bid and hopefully you will walk away with a great deal.