I have had several awesome deals.... in most cases, it involved buying a large lot of equipment, then selling off all the gear except for a lens or two that I was able to keep for free. It works out well for both parties.
I walked in to my local chain camera shop (Henry's) about a year ago, to buy ink or paper, I don't recall what exactly. While there I asked the salesman if they had anything interesting in the used equipment department. He pulled out a mint 100-400 and said it had come into the store two days before and that one of the other salesman wanted to buy it but hadn't been able to come up with the money so far. If I wanted it, it was $1,300. At the time, a new one was $1,850. I took it.
About a year ago I picked up an X-700, an X-GL, a 50 1.4, a 50 1.7, a 2x converter, 2 tripods (some crappy ones), a bag of filters, and an auto-winder for either of the cameras for $60. I love CL.
Got a 1DS MKII of of ebay when they were still selling for $7500 new and about $5700 used for $3000. It was listed as broken, but had everything with it. I just was going to take a chance on getting it fixed, however when I got it, the "broken" part of it was that EC was set to +2 1/3 stops, it was a relatively easy fix.
Also picked up a Macbook Air on ebay last fall for about $550 that was in rough condition, turned out to be a prototype and ended up trading Apple for a refurbished one. Google "Macbook Air Prototype" all the top results are from my experience.
A 600/4 non IS lens in Cash Coverters being sold as a 600/4.5FD lens for $700AUD, bought it as soon as I saw it, went home advertised it and sold it for $11500AUD.
Then bought a 600 from USA for $6000AUD and a D30 from camera shop for $5000.
That set me up into the photographic world. Thats about as good a bargain I ever got.
