Anatomy of a Craig's List Deal Going Sideways

[GoldOxide_imp]

A seller lying about an item is always an issue to consider. It can certainly drive down the offer for sure, and of course, none at all.

[Charlie Bravo_imp]

A couple of years ago, I closed a deal on a Triumph Trophy 1200. It was in great shape, low miles, good price. I hadn't paid for it yet, and was having a little trouble lining up the logistics of getting over there to get it. I call the guy, he says he has a trailer, he'll deliver it. Great! He gets to my house, does not take my suggestion to back into my driveway. He unties it, starts it up, and is duckwalking it backwards, get to the ramp, goes down the ramp, into the street, and drops it. It fall over onto it's right side. Engine dies. We pick it up, minimal damage, some scratching on the lower fairing. The only problem, the engine won't restart. He hauls it away, gonna fix it, will call me. Ten days later, I call him. Can't get it started. I offer him a super lowball price, he declines. That was it.

[Gone in 60]

I've got plenty of crazy Craig's List transaction stories. I think the absolute weirdest was selling my Step Dad's Honda Oddyssey. He passed away in 2013, and my Mom said seeing his van in the driveway made her sad. So, I took it home, cleaned it up a bit, took some pictures, and posted it on Craig's.

About five minutes after I listed it, I got a call from a man with a very strange accent. "You sell van. I come now, money. You text address."
I texted my address to the number, and about ten minutes later, he called again. "I'm outside now. You come out."

I came outside to my parking lot, and saw the man looking over the Oddyssey. What was very odd was the fact that he was alone, and no other cars were nearby. So, he had been dropped off with cash. I said hello. He was clearly familiar with the weak points of the Honda, the air conditioning and the transmission. He got in the van, started the engine, turned on the AC, and held his hand over the vent until it blew cold. He then opened the hood, pulled out the transmission dipstick, and proceeded to smell and taste the fluid.

"AC and transmission OK. We have deal!" He pulled out a neat stack of $100 bills, with the final bill wrapped into an origami band around the rest of the bills. He then glanced at the gas gauge, hovering right above empty. "Wait a minute... fifty bucks gas!" and held out his hand. I reached into my pocket and gave him the $40 that was in my wallet. He then handed me his stack of cash.

I said "great, let's do the paperwork", holding out his half of the title and a pen. "I no have time!" He handed me a piece of paper with a name and address scrawled on it, grabbed his portion of the title, and sped off in the van. The entire transaction took less than five minutes.

I walked into the house, and my wife, who had been watching from the doorway, said "What the hell just happened?" "I don't know... I have money and my half of the title... we can make this work." I called my Mom and told her to call the insurance company and take the Oddyssey off of the policy. "I'll do it tomorrow." "No, Mom, do it now. A strange man just fell from the sky, handed me origami money, and drove off in the van. Do it now!"

I filled in the Release of Liability portion of the title with the information the man handed me, and immediately took it to AAA to submit it and get it out of the family name. Everything happend so quickly, that the next morning, I realized that I had left my sunglasses in the van. I called the number the man had called me from, but it had been shut off. The address, in Fountain Valley, was on my way to work, so I tried to find it. The address didn't exist.

[GoldOxide_imp]

Excellent read Gin60.

lol - " ... you will sell me CB1100 for 1900 dalla ... "

Yeah, we have those too.

I felt kinda sad reading as your [Step] Dad's cage disappeared quickly and forever.

[Gone in 60]

Meh... nothing too sentimental about a Honda van, other than the death-grip my Mom had on the armrest most of the time she was riding in the passenger seat with him driving. I got really good at staring down at the carpet when I rode in the back seat, so I didn't have to watch my perpetual impending doom.

[Houtman_imp]

Perhaps the Honda Odessy was wanted to commit a crime ?

[Gone in 60]

I'm thinking that by the end of the day, it had been painted yellow and sitting at the cab line at John Wayne Airport. The only two things the guy cared about were the known problems with that van.

[furious_blue_imp]

It is getting so hard these days to sell things on CL. There are so many scammers trying to get your personal info, it becomes pretty risking for the seller.

We listed our BMW X5 on CL about a year ago, had the listing up for 3 days and every person that reached out asked us for Mobile number, address and bank name so they could prepare to send us a check. We gave none of that info out, and on day three our bank called asking about suspicious activity with our bank account. When my wife told the bank we were trying to sell a car on CL, the bank rep said "Oh honey, you need to take that add down. We've deflected six individual attempts to access your account. People are finding your personal info somehow through the add." Add came down, and hack attempts stopped immediately.

We had three people claim they wanted to send us a check immediately if we could deliver the car through their preferred delivery service. WTH?

It's crazy how much this stuff happens...

FWIW: I've heard of a few cases in which the 'remote check' and 'delivery service' deals were legit.

This YouTuber in LA bought a Lamborghini located in Canada and took delivery from a delivery service' truck in a busy residential street. Video documented the car getting offloaded from the truck (and that is some rig there !):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FF3V5WXrcM0