If you're not looking for popular items, you can get very lucky very easily. Just look and don't bid until the last 5-10 minutes of the auction. Otherwise, you're just wasting time and making the item unnecessarily more expensive. If you're looking for something mainstream, then you'll get the price lower than anywhere else, but then you'll get raped with the ubiquitous $10-20 shipping charge. Yup, buy a single sock on eBay for 50 cents, and pay $10 for shipping and handling...and maybe a couple of dollars extra for insurance. Highway-fucking-robbery. PEACE.