One of the techniques used at a live auction, where there is an auctioneer barking out bid requests is to get your emotions jumping. The quick tongue of these professionals works miracles in extracting additional bids from those in attendance, so make sure you keep yourself in check. One way to do this is to set a limit on what you are willing to bid. You can keep this amount tucked away in some part of your brain or you can write it down in advance of the auction; that way the auctioneer will be less likely to prod you beyond your fixed limit.

Online auctions don’t have an auctioneer, but they still manage to get the excitement going, especially in the last few seconds of the auction. One way to avoid this is to use proxy bidding, where you bid the highest amount you are willing to bid. The computer then bids up your bid as necessary, while its bidding against other bidders, until it reaches your max bid.

Setting these limits for yourself in advance of the auction will help you from over bidding due to the excitement of the auction.