The Official "Unofficial" Yahoo Auctions Purchasing Guide
Posted: Wed Sep 23, 2020 6:50 pm
Finally got around to making this mini guide so here it goes. Buckle up kids!
Since Rakuten global has shutdown I decided to move over to yahoo auctions for most of my purchases. I prefer buying from used shops in Japan since I primarily collect Seiko and other harder to find jdm models. Now when I first started using yahoo auctions it was pretty overwhelming but its really not as hard as it looks. If you were comfortable with Rakuten Global this won't be much worse.
Here is yahoo auctions site: https://auctions.yahoo.co.jp/
Here is a good way to find and buy something on there from my experience:
1) USE GOOGLE AUTO TRANSLATE
Its a Japanese site duh! You won't get anywhere before setting up auto translate through your browser.
2) Know what you're looking for! (But have an open mind)
Now I am guilty of not following this since I usually browse every listing and stumble across cool watches I had never heard of before. But you will have a much easier time if you go into it knowing every little detail about the watch you want such as price, market value, service costs, what the fakes look like etc.
Now this doesn't mean you will find the exact thing you want so I always browse with an "open mind" so I will settle on the watch condition, or maybe dial color, or movement accuracy etc. Beggars can't be choosers. Well at least I can't because I'm cheap
3) Buy the seller
Just like eBay, don't buy from brand new low rating accounts. It just never turns out well. Look at seller's ratings for anything 4 stars and up. When you click their profile, you will also see comments made by previous customers rating them.
4) Is it an auction or listing?
That’s right- not everything on yahoo auctions is an auction. You will see listings that say "prompt decision price" meaning that price is the buyout option similar to eBay’s "buy it now" feature. Most stuff is an auction so be careful. You can see the number of bids placed and questions asked on the product listing itself. Another key thing to look at for auctions is the number of people who have added the product to their wish list. If I see over 30 wish lists, I usually don't bother bidding.
That leads onto another point, bidding itself. It's not like eBay! Basically, you can place a bid up to your max amount and it will auto bid for you. BUT when the auction is about to end any further bids increase the duration by 15 minutes, so good luck trying to auction snipe! Everyone will get an email instantly that they were outbid and simply login to outbid you.
5) Use the right Proxy for you
There are a billion different proxies out there so I can't cover them all. Do your own research and decide which you think is best. A proxy is the "middleman" essentially. You buy the product, it gets sent to the proxy's warehouse, then they pack it and ship to you. Every proxy charges differently for their services.
I use https://zenmarket.jp/en/ as they have fair fees and are reliable. They let you copy and paste yahoo links to their site and auto translate. They also let you browse through their site athough I find it misses a lot of listings. They charge 300 jpy for each product in your order, plus the shipping cost, plus insurance fees. I like Zenmarket because they are the only proxy to let you change the declaration amount to whatever you want and still insure for full value. Now you are probably wondering "But AndroidIsAwesome, isn't that illegal?" YES PROBABLY so don't blame me if you do this and customs holds your parcel for declaring too low. Unless you're ordering Rolex, Gucci etc most border agents have 0 clue what watches are worth.
Anyways, there are a few more fees to keep in mind. When you buy the product, it will have a shipping fee to the proxy warehouse, usually no more than 1500 jpy in my experience. Plus, a lot will have Japanese sales tax which is 10%.
Other good proxies are buyee.jp (they charge as a % of sale though which I dislike), dejapan.com , fromjapan.co.jp etc.
Now proxies also will use their agents to buy things you request on Japanese sites too. So, don't feel limited to only yahoo auctions! Another thing to note is when bidding through proxies 99% of them force you to deposit funds into your balance before bidding. Which makes sense, why would they let you bid with their credit when they don't even know you? Zenmarket at least lets users withdraw money from their funds if you no longer need it on there. So be prepared for the 3% or whatever credit card exchange fee when depositing money.
6) Be patient!
Still with me? Good. So, you've gone ahead and found the watch you like and placed the order. Don't expect it to get to your house in a week. Even 2 weeks. Maybe even 3 weeks. Remember that it gets shipped to the proxy first, then the proxy inspects and packs it, then they quote your shipping fee, so you pay that and pick the shipping option, then they ship it out to you. I've had some take 2 weeks; others take 6 weeks.
Another tip- if you had a favorite seller on Rakuten Global such as Closer for example, most have yahoo profiles as well. Just google “yahoo auctions closer” and 90% of the time their store page comes up.
And lastly remember - ALL SALES ARE FINAL. Goodluck returning something that’s broken or not what you expected. It's basically impossible. If a product looks too good to be true it probably is.
Hopefully that gives you a good start on using the site. It can be very rewarding going through the hassle to save a ton of money or find that rare watch you've always wanted! Now you better not be buying stuff from my watchlist
Since Rakuten global has shutdown I decided to move over to yahoo auctions for most of my purchases. I prefer buying from used shops in Japan since I primarily collect Seiko and other harder to find jdm models. Now when I first started using yahoo auctions it was pretty overwhelming but its really not as hard as it looks. If you were comfortable with Rakuten Global this won't be much worse.
Here is yahoo auctions site: https://auctions.yahoo.co.jp/
Here is a good way to find and buy something on there from my experience:
1) USE GOOGLE AUTO TRANSLATE
Its a Japanese site duh! You won't get anywhere before setting up auto translate through your browser.
2) Know what you're looking for! (But have an open mind)
Now I am guilty of not following this since I usually browse every listing and stumble across cool watches I had never heard of before. But you will have a much easier time if you go into it knowing every little detail about the watch you want such as price, market value, service costs, what the fakes look like etc.
Now this doesn't mean you will find the exact thing you want so I always browse with an "open mind" so I will settle on the watch condition, or maybe dial color, or movement accuracy etc. Beggars can't be choosers. Well at least I can't because I'm cheap
3) Buy the seller
Just like eBay, don't buy from brand new low rating accounts. It just never turns out well. Look at seller's ratings for anything 4 stars and up. When you click their profile, you will also see comments made by previous customers rating them.
4) Is it an auction or listing?
That’s right- not everything on yahoo auctions is an auction. You will see listings that say "prompt decision price" meaning that price is the buyout option similar to eBay’s "buy it now" feature. Most stuff is an auction so be careful. You can see the number of bids placed and questions asked on the product listing itself. Another key thing to look at for auctions is the number of people who have added the product to their wish list. If I see over 30 wish lists, I usually don't bother bidding.
That leads onto another point, bidding itself. It's not like eBay! Basically, you can place a bid up to your max amount and it will auto bid for you. BUT when the auction is about to end any further bids increase the duration by 15 minutes, so good luck trying to auction snipe! Everyone will get an email instantly that they were outbid and simply login to outbid you.
5) Use the right Proxy for you
There are a billion different proxies out there so I can't cover them all. Do your own research and decide which you think is best. A proxy is the "middleman" essentially. You buy the product, it gets sent to the proxy's warehouse, then they pack it and ship to you. Every proxy charges differently for their services.
I use https://zenmarket.jp/en/ as they have fair fees and are reliable. They let you copy and paste yahoo links to their site and auto translate. They also let you browse through their site athough I find it misses a lot of listings. They charge 300 jpy for each product in your order, plus the shipping cost, plus insurance fees. I like Zenmarket because they are the only proxy to let you change the declaration amount to whatever you want and still insure for full value. Now you are probably wondering "But AndroidIsAwesome, isn't that illegal?" YES PROBABLY so don't blame me if you do this and customs holds your parcel for declaring too low. Unless you're ordering Rolex, Gucci etc most border agents have 0 clue what watches are worth.
Anyways, there are a few more fees to keep in mind. When you buy the product, it will have a shipping fee to the proxy warehouse, usually no more than 1500 jpy in my experience. Plus, a lot will have Japanese sales tax which is 10%.
Other good proxies are buyee.jp (they charge as a % of sale though which I dislike), dejapan.com , fromjapan.co.jp etc.
Now proxies also will use their agents to buy things you request on Japanese sites too. So, don't feel limited to only yahoo auctions! Another thing to note is when bidding through proxies 99% of them force you to deposit funds into your balance before bidding. Which makes sense, why would they let you bid with their credit when they don't even know you? Zenmarket at least lets users withdraw money from their funds if you no longer need it on there. So be prepared for the 3% or whatever credit card exchange fee when depositing money.
6) Be patient!
Still with me? Good. So, you've gone ahead and found the watch you like and placed the order. Don't expect it to get to your house in a week. Even 2 weeks. Maybe even 3 weeks. Remember that it gets shipped to the proxy first, then the proxy inspects and packs it, then they quote your shipping fee, so you pay that and pick the shipping option, then they ship it out to you. I've had some take 2 weeks; others take 6 weeks.
Another tip- if you had a favorite seller on Rakuten Global such as Closer for example, most have yahoo profiles as well. Just google “yahoo auctions closer” and 90% of the time their store page comes up.
And lastly remember - ALL SALES ARE FINAL. Goodluck returning something that’s broken or not what you expected. It's basically impossible. If a product looks too good to be true it probably is.
Hopefully that gives you a good start on using the site. It can be very rewarding going through the hassle to save a ton of money or find that rare watch you've always wanted! Now you better not be buying stuff from my watchlist