Ebay is the biggest internet store in the world, and you can find just about anything for sale there, including books, music, and entertainment, enterprises, collectibles, and yes, fitness machinery. There are over 12000 categories of things for sale on Ebay, so take your time checking before you buy, and make sure you're getting exactly what you think you're getting before you make that decision.

You have to be good at using the category system if you want to have any chance of finding what you're looking for on Ebay. When I looked there were over a million things for sale under "sports", over 340,000 under "sports; sporting goods" and then 7146 items when I narrowed the search down to "sports; sporting goods, exercise and fitness".

How Ebay works is that you can either bid on a product for sale, or buy it outright, if the seller provides that option, which isn't always the case. This means that there is a great likelihood that you'll have to wait through an auction system if you hope to buy a piece of fitness machinery on Ebay. The problem with this approach is that you're not guaranteed to win the auction, so you might end up wasting a lot of time before you finally get what you're looking for. The advantage is that you can get some really good deals if you're lucky.

I looked at several products: The Total Trainer is a system based on the Total Gym advertised by Chuck Norris and Christie Brinkley. Whereas Total Gym sells for around $500, Ebay had a Total Trainer up for sale at the price of $277 for a straight purchase.

I also looked at a copy of Fast Abs, which is an electronic muscle stimulating belt that goes for about thirty dollars plus shipping if you buy it from the manufacturer. The copy was selling on Ebay for ten to fifteen dollars, and shipping was free.

Smart Abs, which usually goes for anywhere between seventy and eighty dollars in the real world was for sale on Ebay for fifty dollars.

The Gazelle Freestyle Elite by Tony Little sells for around four hundred dollars, but the Fitness Quest Glider, which is a comparable product, was on Ebay for around half that price.

Finally, I took a look at an exercise system involving weights attached to shoes, introduced by Jolie World. At her website they sell for twenty bucks, but on Ebay I found them offered for fifteen, which is a saving of one quarter.

Do your research and make a careful decision. There are a lot of items for sale on Ebay that look and sound good, but turn out to be defective or substandard when you get them. It is worth your while to go the extra mile to make sure you know what you're getting. Ask the seller questions about the product to be as positive as you can be that it's high quality. If you find a good product at a good price, thank your lucky stars and go ahead and buy it.

Do not wait, because there are other people on Ebay looking for that exact item, and if they buy it before you make up your mind, you'll have to start your search all over again.