How often have you seen something you’ve longed for badly, only to lament that you can’t afford it? Well, luxuries are not only for the rich, says the newly revamped tatarah.com.sg, which gives you a chance to own that coveted brand new car for perhaps 23 cents?

If you think this is some practical joke, UrbanWire isn’t kidding you. This local company has put an interesting twist on auction shopping.

First launched in 25 Oct and having gone under a makeover and relaunched on 9 Nov, tatarah.com.sg has a motto – “Dream it. Own it.” Don’t we all wish it were so…

Going once, going twice, sold!

You know how typical auctions go, the highest bidder wins. But not all of us can afford to keep hollering to push a bid upwards and win the auction, paying a price close to the item’s retail price, or more. That’s where tatarah.com.sg comes in with a highest single bid model. If you switch off at this moment, thinking, “it’s still about being the highest…”, hold your horses. In this bidding mayhem, not only do you need to be the highest bidder, you also have to be the only one with that bid price. Thus, if you’re the only bidder who placed a bid of $0.21 and it’s the highest amount, you win! In an event where there is no single bidder, the first person between the 2 bidders with the same bid wins.

Also, the maximum bid rule laid down by tatarah.com.sg, which is typically set at half the retail price, will ensure that you’ll get a steal! To put the icing on the cake, bidding starts at a mere $0.01! And they’re all brand new items.

What’s the catch?

As you check out the website, viewing past auctions, you realise that nothing was sold for more than a dollar. The next thought that runs through your mind will probably be, “How do they survive?”. It all seems too good to be true.

They survive by having something called a “processing fee”. This fee, is a fixed price you have to pay whenever you place a bid. So, one can bid for as many as times as he wants, as long as he can afford paying the processing fees. For example, if the fee is a dollar for every bid, you pay $100 for 100 bids, even if you didn’t win the bid.

Another catch is that you’ll never know what bids people have made. The previous tatarah did not provide a history of who has bid what, but now they’ve added a “live” feed for the latest bid, making things a little more strategic for you. But unless you can stay at your computer all day for as long as the auction is active, which is about 10 days, you’re odds are closer to striking Toto or 4D (local lottery product).

The odds against you really depend on the number of bidders, the number of times they bid and being creative with the bids that you come up with. The more people a certain auction attracts, the smaller a chance you have. Of course, the thought of owning something reasonably valuable for less than a dollar (excluding 7% GST) is good enough reason for you to want to try!

Is it a scam?

No, it isn’t. On their website, they have addressed concerns of them being a con job. It’s nothing you can blame the public for, since it really does sound too sweet on our ears too. What if all their winners were planted? The truth is, we can’t answer that question for you. Only the owners have the answer to that and it’s up to you to believe them. If you can’t believe them but can’t resist the temptation of bidding, they have partners such as Harvey Norman, Aramsa Spas and Stuff magazine to lend their reputation and credibility to this new start-up.

They’re also VeriSign Secured, which states that they are a legal running business and have encrypted data transmission so that your details cannot be phished.

With that, UrbanWire is currently busy at the moment… “…look at that dream bid for a Mercedes Kompressor that’s coming soon! Must bid!”