How do I find Japan auction sites

[jrr74]

I stumbled across a Takara pony blog site today which listed previous auctioned Takara ponies with most of the sales occurring in Japan.  I did a brief search for Japanese on-line auction sites and came up empty handed     With that being said, I'm hoping one of you fine people can shed some light on how to find and register for such sites 

Also, are these pretty reliable sites?  Takara ponies are expensive and I would prefer to avoid anything shady.

[flying_narwhal]

I personally shop frequently on Yahoo! Japan (http://auctions.yahoo.co.jp/). It is sort of like a Japanese version of eBay, with both auctions and "buy-it-now" listings. The majority of the auctions will only ship within Japan so you will need a third-party deputy service to bid on the item and ship it to you. I personally use Buyee, which I believe is an official partner for Yahoo! Japan. I have personally used this service for several years and have never had any issues with them. They have always been reliable, quick to ship, and fast to respond to any inquiries I had. There are other deputy services which others may recommend as well, I just haven't personally used any of them. Like ebay, on Yahoo! Japan you are purchasing from individuals or small businesses so the reliability of each purchase is really dependent on the individual seller (similar to ebay- some good sellers, some bad sellers). The service I use will block you from purchasing from individuals with low feedback scores or new sellers to try and prevent this.

Yahoo! Japan's auctions differ from eBay in that you can't really "snipe" an auction- seller's have to option to allow their listings duration by 5 extra minutes if someone places a bid within the last 5 minutes. So if I bid with 30 seconds left, it will extend the auction an additional 5 minutes. This can get really annoying, I've bid on auctions that have been extended an annoying amount of additional time (like 25 minutes) because people would keep swooping in under that 5 minute mark and extending the auction.

Keep in mind though that the fees can add up when using a deputy service- price of the item + fee for purchasing the item (usually a % of the item's final sale price) + domestic shipping + international shipping cost + consolidation fee should you choose to combine multiple purchases into one shipment. If you purchase using a credit card they will likely charge you a fee for converting the currency as well (I use Paypal so it's not an issue).

Japan's international shipping prices have gone up within the last few months and the ratio of the yen against the US dollar is also getting stronger which adds to the costs of purchasing from Japan as well.

I hope this information is helpful! I'm happy to answer any additional questions you might have 

[jrr74]

Wow!  Thank you so much flying_narwhal for all that helpful information.  That is a pretty involved process, but I will definitely look into it.  You just may get a pm from me down the road in case I get stuck along the way or just need some additional advice. 

 

[princessluna11706]

I often stalk Yahoo auctions Japan too

[flying_narwhal]

Wow!  Thank you so much flying_narwhal for all that helpful information.  That is a pretty involved process, but I will definitely look into it.  You just may get a pm from me down the road in case I get stuck along the way or just need some additional advice. 

 

Feel free to pm me if you need help or have questions, I'm more than happy to provide assistance 

[Galactica]

I use a third party service as well- it is not a simple process - first you have to sign up for the third party buyer program, most require that you have money in their account for you before you buy things- then you buy your thing, it is shipped to them, they ship it to you (after skimming a percentage off the top for their services)

It can get pricey so you'd better really want it.

[Taffeta]

I've been using the Yahoo.jp auctions for the past ten years or so. Now I think there are some options to buy direct but most Japanese sellers don't want to do that, so finding a trustworthy proxy is really important. A lot of them will also buy direct from Japanese sale sites for you. This is relevant, as the only Takara item I have was a MIB fashion I actually bought  direct from a second hand sale site and NOT from Y!JA. So find out if the proxy you are looking at just does auctions (as I suspect Buyee might) or also does other things.

One thing I will say, though - there are a lot of MLP auctions on Y!JA these days but very few Takara items. And those there are go very high because now everyone knows the site is there. (I genuinely regret not looking for Takara ten years ago when I was buying out of production CDs and stuff, but never mind, I'd probably just have sold them anyway). Sometimes the odd thing comes up with a BIN but you have to watch the site a lot.

Also helps if you can write My Little Pony and the various variations on the theme in Japanese script. Many proxies offer a translated search service but I've noticed at times some auctions don't show up on them, and others are bizarrely translated.

So I would recommend trying to conduct the search in the original language, as more stuff comes up that way.

[Carrehz]

Also helps if you can write My Little Pony and the various variations on the theme in Japanese script. Many proxies offer a translated search service but I've noticed at times some auctions don't show up on them, and others are bizarrely translated.

So I would recommend trying to conduct the search in the original language, as more stuff comes up that way.

Yup, this マイリトルポニー will get more results than My Little Pony.

Also I don't know if it's been said on here before or not, but Buyee/Tenso, at least, allow you to consolidate packages sent there into one parcel, so that can help to save on shipping costs (it can still get pretty pricey though).

Mandarake is another good Japanese shopping site - they ship internationally so there's no need for a proxy service - I don't know how much MLP stuff they sell but it's always worth a look. (I believe someone did find a Takara at one of their stores a few years ago) Only downside is that many of the items they sell are also on sale in their actual, physical stores so sometimes they do sell things before they can be taken off the site, if that makes sense. That hasn't happened to me too often, though ^^

Good luck hunting!

[lovesbabysquirmy]

There is a thread in Pony Corral about *some* Japanese items... a bulk order to save on fees:

http://mlparena.com/index.php/topic,381824.0.html

If people did this more often, it would be easier to bring things across the ocean!

[Taffeta]

The problem with the group buying thing is that the recipients may end up paying double fees if the Arena proxy is in a different country. But in theory it's a good idea xD. I think that's mostly for new stuff though, unless I'm mistaken?

I think it was Mandarake that I got the Takara fashion from. It cost me about $25-30ish.

Another good keyword to try is おしゃれなポニー　(Oshare na pony) and if you want to try and eliminate the Hasbro ponies that are all over the place now, it helps to add in Takara タカラ。Japanese search engines are notoriously sensitive to both script type and kanji, and if you use the wrong one it might not come up, so I suggest if you can't type Japanese/don't have the IME installed, copy-paste to make sure

I very rarely see Takara come up, though. And the last one I saw come up went up to an amount that, with conversion and proxy fees would have cost the same or more as they cost within the community. I think a lot of ponypeople are using this method, so it is probably not the best one if you want to find a cheap Takara.

Not that I know what that best method is...I just don't want anyone to go to this site thinking they'll find tons of Takara ponies. It really isn't that way at all.

[Loa]

To buy my dolls direct from Japan I use Rinkya, a third party service. They are very reliable.

[jrr74]

Thank you for all the replies.  A lot of helpful information in the above posts.  I would be happy with just a fair price.  I really want to add Milky to my collection.  If I can increase the number of venues to look for her, my odds of one day finding her with greatly improve 

[Taffeta]

Thank you for all the replies.  A lot of helpful information in the above posts.  I would be happy with just a fair price.  I really want to add Milky to my collection.  If I can increase the number of venues to look for her, my odds of one day finding her with greatly improve 

Then you might also want to try adding ミルキー into your searches. (I don't know if you can read it, but if not, that's Milky's name in Japanese characters).