11-01-2014, 11:40 PM
I like to use bike specific sites and forums to sell, instead of CL. I had mostly ridden BMWs for the past dozen or so years and used the MOA and IBMWR sites to sell.
I always get a feel for someone by talking to them on the phone. Email and text is OK, but not for getting a feel for someone. A couple of bikes I've sold, I've wound up talking to the buyer for like 45 minutes to an hour on the phone about all kinds of bikes. A scammer will not put in the effort and talk to you for an hour on the phone, IMO.
On long distance deals, in may cases, someone has to trust the other first. I shipped one bike to Michigan without ever meeting the buyer. The funds were sent first by him, then I did the shipping. Another time, I was the buyer and wired the funds to Chicago and then they shipped the bike. I had googled the seller and found him to be a bank president with pages and pages of charity work and he was quite wealthy. So I figured he didn't earn his reputation by scamming people out of a $7000 motorcycle!
I delivered a Harley from NJ to Annapolis and met the buyer in the Navy Federal Credit Union parking lot and went into the bank with him and received the cash on the spot and handed over the bike. As others have said, Cash is the way to go, especially on face-to-face in-person deals. Also, some buyers are reluctant to bring a bank check that's already made out to the seller because if the buyer changes his mind, there's fees for them to turn the check back in to the bank, as well as waiting times to have the cash back in their account.
I always get a feel for someone by talking to them on the phone. Email and text is OK, but not for getting a feel for someone. A couple of bikes I've sold, I've wound up talking to the buyer for like 45 minutes to an hour on the phone about all kinds of bikes. A scammer will not put in the effort and talk to you for an hour on the phone, IMO.
On long distance deals, in may cases, someone has to trust the other first. I shipped one bike to Michigan without ever meeting the buyer. The funds were sent first by him, then I did the shipping. Another time, I was the buyer and wired the funds to Chicago and then they shipped the bike. I had googled the seller and found him to be a bank president with pages and pages of charity work and he was quite wealthy. So I figured he didn't earn his reputation by scamming people out of a $7000 motorcycle!
I delivered a Harley from NJ to Annapolis and met the buyer in the Navy Federal Credit Union parking lot and went into the bank with him and received the cash on the spot and handed over the bike. As others have said, Cash is the way to go, especially on face-to-face in-person deals. Also, some buyers are reluctant to bring a bank check that's already made out to the seller because if the buyer changes his mind, there's fees for them to turn the check back in to the bank, as well as waiting times to have the cash back in their account.