There are many ways to start a home business online, and feware easier than eBay - the world's largest online auctionsite. However, there is one critical condition - you have toknow what to sell and how to sell it. That is exactly whatDavid Guindon's software program Hot Item Finder claims todo.

After purchasing the software, I had huge hopes of itdelivering on it's promise of finding hot items on eBay.Though there were times when certain features would notwork, I found Dave to be quick to not only fix the problembut also offer a new updated release for everyone. In factfree updates for life is one of the major benefits to HotItem Finder.

You may not have heard of David Guindon. Currently workingon a master's degree in electrical engineering, he developedHot Item Finder to aid his own eBay research. Since thenhe's gone on to earn a reputation for quality andcreativity.

Hot Item Finder makes doing research on eBay a snap byallowing you to search for products by keyword or categoryand then filter the search based on the number of bids, thecurrent price, and more. But what I especially like is thecategory search by completed listings. I can pick acategory, tell the software that I want auctions alreadycompleted with 20 or more bids and voila! I have a hot listof products I know are selling as well as links to thecompleted auctions so I can see what makes them sell sowell.

Dave promises on his website that you can "find all the hotitems on eBay in minutes." Well, it may take just a littlelonger than "minutes" but I created lists of productsamazingly fast.

I will say, it took me a few tries to get the hang of thesoftware, but after playing around with it I was movingaround like a pro. I have no doubt that anyone, regardlessof experience, can use Hot Item Finder to it's fullestpotential and find out exactly what to sell and what tosteer clear of.

I think the filtering feature is what really makes Hot ItemFinder powerful. Frankly, you can find all the sameinformation on eBay, but that can be very tedious andlabor-intensive. Simply being able to filter out items basedon bids and selling price is a huge time-saver. Thissoftware tells you what's selling, for how much and whatpeople are willing to bid. It's fantastic marketingintelligence. I used it to auction 18 items. All 18 soldwith double-digit bids and closed within 5% of my targetprice range. I was hooked.

One improvement I think that can be made, however, issomehow listing the starting bid along with the closing bid.This way, as a seller you can quickly see how effective somelisting strategies are over others. But who's being picky?

Finding the right products to sell on eBay is obviouslycritical to success. Sifting through thousands of auctionsat eBay to find a few winners can be overwhelming andpossibly discouraging. Hot Item Finder makes the job theproverbial "piece of cake" - and does it with style. You cancheck it out by going to http://www.hotitemsnow.com.Overall, I have to say that Hot Item Finder is an absoluteMUST GET.

Hopefully one day, Dave will figure out a way to make HotItem Finder even more explosive by somehow including otherauction sites such as Yahoo Auctions and Amazon Auctions.Until then, Hot Item Finder more than fits the bill.

Chris Custer is a freelance writer and publisher of the eAuction Gazette, a newsletter that provides tips and techniques for auction selling success. Subscribe by going to http://www.eauctiongazette.com