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Anyone buy a vehicle over Ebay? What's the risk? **CL/Ebay SCAM**

3K views 24 replies 14 participants last post by  JohnnyJ 
#1 · (Edited)
with all the scams out there I'm skeptical about this deal.

Vehicle was listed on CL last week, the guy emailed back yesterday saying he now has it on Ebay. The add says I can use Ebay's VPP which says I only make a deposit, then I get the vehicle for 10 days before I need to either make final payment or request a refund and send vehicle back. Is this correct? anyone ever buy with VPP?
it is a vehicle in lower MI so shipping isn't a big deal, price is low so it isn't a huge risk, and the Ebay person has 500+ positive reportings, including a vehicle in 2012 that was $23k. (this one is only $1500)

so what's the risk?
 
#2 · (Edited)
If you buy a vehicle over ebay, pay with paypal to the account listed on the ebay auction, you are at zero liability if it turns out fraudulent.

I have purchased two vehicles from ebay, both turned out great. Call the seller, talk to them, you will know immediately if they are legit.

The protection plan seems odd, especially for a $1500 purchase
 
#4 ·
I just bought a 67 f100 off ebay in nevada. I was worried as shit about getting hosed but the guy sent me the title right away as I searched for a shipper. The truck will be here tomorrow and so far I'm not concerned. The biggest pain was dealing with shipping. The truck so long as its as straight in the pics will be getting a new drivetrain and suspension all around anyway so I wasent to concerned about those things. It runs and drives though so thats a bonus till winter when I tear into it.
 
#5 ·
I have bought and sold several vehicles on eBay; one of which was in N. Carolina. I always give the down payment through Paypal after I talk to the person on the phone directly once. After I give the deposit, I will usually talk to them a couple more times, at least, before I head to pick the vehilcle up (have never had one shipped site-unseen before...I always go pick the vehicles up myself). Then I will hand carry the remainder of the payment as a cashier's check to give to the seller, but I don't hand it over until I have visually inspected the vehicle and everything looks good/legit. That way, if something seems fishy or the vehicle is not as described, I am only out the down payment, which is covered under Paypal/eBay. It provides a good out and a means to walk away if necessary.

The big things to remember:

1) Always check the sellers feedback and make sure they have plenty and are high (I feel comfortable at above 95% positive, personally).

2) Call the seller to get a feel for them (and to make sure they're a real person) before giving any money...even the down payment. Explain to them what you are doing. If they are a normal human being, they will understand that you are about to make a hefty purchase, site-unseen, and you just want to be sure everything is on the up and up.

3) Look over the pictures as much as possible and ask the seller questions (I have even asked for additional pictures of specific things).

4) Also provide yourself with some kind of out (i.e., hand carry a check for the remainder of the payment?) if things go sour when you show to pick up the vehicle. Nothing will suck more if you show up and the vehicle is a total rust bucket with no engine and you have already made the full payment via Paypal. You can dispute it and not release the funds, but it is still going to take time and they will launch some type of investigation before releasing the money back to you.

It can be nerve-racking but every single one of mine have always worked out fine. There are plenty of horror stories out there, but generally people are honest or, at least, try to be. You just have to remember to always CYA when making a large purchase in this manner, that's all.
 
#8 ·
PM me your email and I will forward you the email, my IT guy says I should not click it again, he couldn't' find anything wrong on my computer, but there was something funny about it.

1. sending email was not @Ebay
2. when I click buy it now it wanted me to log into Ebay, but I was already logged in (no, I did not re enter my info)
3. going to Ebay and searching for the item, by description, or item number, I could not find the same item.

My IT guy did say there was a strange spooler exe running on my computer, he didn't know if it had to do with this or not, he killed it, I rebooted, everything is fine on my computer and the spooler exe did not come back on.
 
#9 ·
It's a scam. I had someone tell me the same thing after replying to a c list ad. Said the truck had been sold once and the buyer backed out. The truck was more in ebays lot in Omaha Nebraska. The whole thing screamed scam but I had fun messing with the guy. Is the vehicle under priced in your opinion? This truck was and I had a feeling it was a scam to begin with.
 
#11 ·
Yes, I did this as soon as I got his email, and posted the question here because I was skeptical.

It's definitely a scam site, it wanted me to enter my log in info for Ebay, but I was already logged into Ebay, so that's when I asked the IT guy here to take a look.
 
#13 ·
Oh boy, just got this back from him

Yes the Tracker is fully covered by ebay VPP terms and policies. The soonest I'm able to show the Tracker is on Friday this week to the buyer/winner of the auction. I'm sorry about this. The auction will not last long.

Bradley

Sent from HQ PDA


Should I report this somewhere?

The claim is the car is in Lansing.
 
#14 ·
I bought two cars on ebay. One showed up on the truck to my location just fine. The other one took me about 4 months to get the car and when I finally did it was totally trashed. Reported and nothing ever came of it. The guy didn't exist. Pictures may have been of another car but I got hosed big time.
 
#24 ·
For *real* ads on Ebay, I've been successful buying remotely, and using UShip. I got my 71 K5 that way. I did quite a bit of homework though, to make sure the guy, and his bank were all real before finalizing payments and such. In my case, the guy was quite nice, and everything was exactly as he said. My Uship carrier was a bit of a PITA, though.
 
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