Connect your AI assistant (MCP)

BigFlippa can be driven by an AI assistant. Connect one, and you can say things like “set up a radar for MacBook Pros near Austin”, “what are my best deals this week?”, or “shortlist that one” instead of clicking through the web app. It works with Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor, and any other assistant that supports remote MCP connectors.

MCP — Model Context Protocol — is the open standard AI assistants use to connect to outside services. You do not need to understand it to use this. You paste one URL into your assistant, sign in, and approve access.

What you can do once connected

Talk to your assistant normally. It works out which actions to take.

Your radars. List them, look at one in detail, create a new one, pause or resume one, delete one, and mark a radar’s matches as seen. You can also ask it to preview the searches it would derive from a description, without creating anything.

Your matches. Browse and search them with filters — by radar, shortlisted only, price range, marketplace, posted since a date, and minimum opportunity. Open a single match for its full description and photos, and add it to or remove it from your shortlist. Listings that have since been taken down are left out unless you ask for them, and free listings are skipped.

Matches come back sorted by opportunity — the gap between estimated value and asking price — so “show me my best deals” is the natural default rather than something you have to ask for.

Your account. Ask for a summary and you get your plan name, subscription status, how many radars you are using against how many you are allowed, how many searches each radar can watch, your maximum radius, and which marketplaces your plan covers.

Your shortlist is the same one the web app calls Saved Pings, so anything you shortlist by chat is there when you next open the dashboard, and vice versa.

Connecting your assistant

The connector URL is:

https://api.bigflippa.com/mcp

The flow is the same everywhere: add that URL as a custom or remote connector, then sign in when your assistant opens a BigFlippa login page.

Menu names in these apps change fairly often. The paths below were current when this page was last updated — if yours looks different, follow your assistant’s own connector documentation and paste the same URL.

Claude

In claude.ai, open Settings → Connectors, choose Add custom connector, and paste the URL. On a Team or Enterprise plan, an owner has to add the connector for the organisation first, under Organization settings → Connectors, before members can connect individually. See Anthropic’s guide to custom connectors for the current steps.

Claude Code

From your terminal:

claude mcp add --transport http bigflippa https://api.bigflippa.com/mcp

Then run /mcp inside Claude Code to sign in.

ChatGPT

Custom connectors live behind developer mode. Open Settings → Connectors → Advanced, turn on Developer mode, then choose Add custom connector and paste the URL. This is available on paid plans; on Business or Enterprise workspaces an admin may need to permit custom connectors first.

Cursor and other assistants

Anything that supports remote MCP servers with OAuth sign-in should work. Add the URL as a remote or custom MCP server using your assistant’s usual method.

Signing in and granting access

The first time your assistant uses the connector, it opens a BigFlippa login page.

1. Sign in with your normal BigFlippa email and password — the same ones you use on the website.
2. A consent screen asks whether to give the assistant access to your account.
3. Approve it, and the connection is finished.

It stays connected across sessions, so this happens once rather than every time.

Worth knowing:

• It is your account only. Your assistant sees exactly the radars and matches you see when you log in. Nothing is shared with other users.
• You can revoke it any time by removing the connector in your assistant’s settings.
• An active subscription is required, the same as on the website. See plans and limits.

Creating a radar by chat

Creating a radar is deliberately a two-step conversation rather than one command.

When you describe what you want, your assistant first previews the searches it would derive from your description and shows them to you. You can change the wording, drop one, or add your own before anything is created. Only when you confirm does the radar get made.

This is the same review step the web app gives you when you create a radar in the wizard, and it exists for the same reason: it is much cheaper to catch a misunderstanding before the radar starts running than to wonder later why the alerts are off. See writing a good prompt for what makes a description work well.

A new radar starts scanning immediately and takes up one of your active radar slots.

eBay is searched nationwide

A radar’s location and radius apply to Craigslist and Facebook Marketplace. They do not narrow eBay results — eBay is searched nationwide across the US.

This catches people out, because a radar set to a tight radius can still return eBay listings from the other side of the country. If you only want local pickup, say so in the radar’s description rather than relying on the radius. See territory and radius.

Other things to know

• Plan limits are the same as the web app. If you are at your active radar cap, creating another one fails with a clear message. Pause a radar or upgrade. See plans and limits.
• The radius has a minimum, and its maximum comes from your plan. Ask for your account summary and your assistant will tell you what yours is.
• Which marketplaces a radar scans depends on your plan, which is also in the account summary.
• Long lists come back a page at a time (up to 50 radars or 25 matches), along with the true total — so your assistant can tell you when it is only showing you part of the picture. Ask for the next page if you want more.
• If your assistant says you are going too fast, wait a minute and try again. Normal conversation never gets close to this; it only shows up if something is retrying in a loop.

What your assistant cannot do

Some things are deliberately website-only, and no assistant can do them for you:

• Billing and checkout
• Starting, changing, or cancelling a subscription
• Changing your plan
• Profile and account settings

Your assistant can tell you which plan you are on and how much of it you are using, but any change to it happens on the website under Account → Plan and Billing.

Troubleshooting

If your assistant relays an error, here is what it means:

What you see	What it means
active_watchlist_limit_reached	Every active radar slot is in use. Pause a radar or upgrade your plan.
rate_limited	Too many requests in a short window. Wait a minute, then try again.
plan_limit	The request went beyond what your plan allows, such as the radius or a marketplace.
invalid_radar_geography	The radius was below the minimum, or the location was not valid.
temporary_failure	A passing problem, usually while generating searches. Trying again normally works.

If the connection stops working altogether, remove the connector and add it again — that re-runs the sign-in.

Related: Pings and listings · Writing a good prompt · Plans and limits