If you are a Model Railway Fan then you know how expensive the Hobby can be, here in Australia. You can save real money by using E-Bay and the range of locomotives, rolling stock and anything remotely connected with the Hobby is astounding. There is a good range of all gauges of trains and many honest and helpful sellers both here in Australia and, especially in The United States, the Home of Bigtime Railways to help the beginner or the experienced modeler buy well.

One thing that I was really surprised with was that even after the exchange rate between The U.S. Dollar and little Aussie battler was taken in to calculations and U.S. Postage rates you can still buy cheaper than locally on most well known brands of  model trains in most common gauges, ie N Scale and H.O.Gauge, the two most common modeled. Where we live in Far North Queensland ( North of Townsville.) not only is there only just one good Hobby Shop between the Twin Cities, but he constantly struggles to get decent wholesalers, so again E-Bay makes it simple.

One good search option is to look up small lots of trains, eg:  enter N scale lots and it will surprize you what comes up. I recently bought a N scale E-7 Diesel loco and a Dummy (unpowered) B-Unit(cabless) Loco with five(5 )passenger carriages in Union Pacific roadname for $75 Aus. included $17 U.S postage. The same carriages alone are $30Aus appoximately each over here so you can be lucky. 

 Some of the best tips in buying Model Trains is get to know a safe and reliable seller that won't charge a handling fee or wrapping charges and will combine postage fees on extra items or will hold items on reqest untill you have finished bidding on a number of items. One seller may have good prices on locomotives, another will offer packs of five boxcars/carriages for a good price. Another seller maybe good with pre-built buildings. Slowly you will establish a number of sellers that will fill every part of the hobby and after a small number of deals with each seller it soon becomes clear who you can trust. Model Trains is a good family hobby, I involve our Grandchildren as much as possible. If anyone is interested you can always contact me for my list of sellers I use in the hobby, or you can print the list off the other guide I recently added to the Guides Section.

I get NO COMMISSION off anyone but believe the secret to good E-Baying is to help look out for each other and promote good sellers who do the right thing everytime. Happy and succesful bidding to all.

                                     Kind Regards Denis8579