OT: Used Vehicle eBay Motors Scam?

onsdag den 4. juli 2018 kl. 18.38.39 UTC+2 skrev snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com:

gnificantly under market price. The guy has been a bit hard to reach not a nswering his phone and the recording talks about "the text mail subscriber" . Not sure if that is just a generic voice mail greeting or if that is spe cific to some service that you might use to screen calls.

a couple of emails now with the same photos. His story is that he is ship ping out in a couple of days and needs to sell the truck fast. He talks ab out the truck being shipped to me by eBay motors so I can check it out. No t sure if it will have tags or not (I wouldn't think so) so I can drive it on the road. He say he is in the same state as me at some military base. I am central so there aren't any military bases I know of that would be out of driving range. I've asked which base he is on, we'll see if he will te ll me.

ns seem difficult and the transaction seems rather complicated). I'm start ing to think the guy wants to make sure I never meet him. I'm wondering if anyone has heard of a scam like this.

there's a recently been a few cases here that sound similar, very cheap, ne ed to sell fast, just need part payment up front to get the car shipped of course as soon money changes hands the seller disappears and it turns out the picture s where just random pictures off the internet

significantly under market price. The guy has been a bit hard to reach not answering his phone and the recording talks about "the text mail subscribe r". Not sure if that is just a generic voice mail greeting or if that is s pecific to some service that you might use to screen calls.

ed a couple of emails now with the same photos. His story is that he is sh ipping out in a couple of days and needs to sell the truck fast. He talks about the truck being shipped to me by eBay motors so I can check it out. Not sure if it will have tags or not (I wouldn't think so) so I can drive i t on the road. He say he is in the same state as me at some military base. I am central so there aren't any military bases I know of that would be o ut of driving range. I've asked which base he is on, we'll see if he will tell me.

ions seem difficult and the transaction seems rather complicated). I'm sta rting to think the guy wants to make sure I never meet him. I'm wondering if anyone has heard of a scam like this.

need to sell fast, just need part payment up front to get the car shipped o f course as

res where just random pictures off the internet

Ah, no money requested as yet. Since he mentioned eBay motors I figured th e payment would be handled by escrow, but who knows what to expect? The la st email says he can't leave the base for "personal" reasons. I told him I have clearances and can get on base no matter which base he is on and that I really want the car today. lol

At this point I am pretty sure it is a scam. At the price he is asking it would have sold a dozen times already and he could have sold it to someone else on the base if any of that were true.

Funny how many people list stuff and then don't respond to your messages.

Rick C.

I've bought a couple cars on eBay/Craigslist before and tried to buy others where the deal fell through, people try to do all sorts of wacky stuff like sell you cars without titles and stuff that's been clearly water damaged.

currently I just go with my gut if it smells bad f*ck 'em there's no shortage of cars out there. The ideal process goes down one way which is the "normal way" I go meet them at their home or business, have a nice chat, I pay them the money and I leave with the car.

That's how it happens 90% of the time and most people seem able to do that just fine, if they can't do that for whatever reason then I bail. Maybe scam, maybe not, not worth my time to take a risk on or even think about too hard. What makes your car so special you can't do it the way everyone else does, the excuses are lame, I don't want it to hear it.

The "I'm leaving in a few days have to sell fast" is the biggest red flag in the world. If you're in the military in (mostly) peacetime and not a member of the special forces or something you generally know when you're going to deploy more than a few days in advance so what's the big hurry, like you didn't know this was going to happen or something and it's a huge surprise?

Don't tell me you "need to sell fast" like it's my problem, it's not. Guess you should've started earlier as Mom liked to say.

Something to keep in mind: Trucks are very common. Big stacks of money are rare and valuable. There is a clear power imbalance here and an honest seller will not try to make you "work for it" when your cash is the real prize, not their dumpy truck. They will try to accommodate you.

Want to sell me something but you can't even answer your phone when I call to discuss the deal? Well f*ck you then. I guess you hate money.

People who want cheap "under market price" are the target audience for scammers. Seems to work.

significantly under market price. The guy has been a bit hard to reach no t answering his phone and the recording talks about "the text mail subscrib er". Not sure if that is just a generic voice mail greeting or if that is specific to some service that you might use to screen calls.

ved a couple of emails now with the same photos. His story is that he is s hipping out in a couple of days and needs to sell the truck fast. He talks about the truck being shipped to me by eBay motors so I can check it out. Not sure if it will have tags or not (I wouldn't think so) so I can drive it on the road. He say he is in the same state as me at some military base . I am central so there aren't any military bases I know of that would be out of driving range. I've asked which base he is on, we'll see if he will tell me.

tions seem difficult and the transaction seems rather complicated). I'm st arting to think the guy wants to make sure I never meet him. I'm wondering if anyone has heard of a scam like this.

need to sell fast, just need part payment up front to get the car shipped of course as

ures where just random pictures off the internet

Market price is an average. By definition some vehicles usually about half , are under "market price". I've seen no shortage of that. This one is a bit ridiculous though. That's the domain of scammers. Yeah, it works once in a while and that's all they need.

Rick C.

On Wednesday, July 4, 2018 at 12:38:39 PM UTC-4, snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com wr ote:

ns seem difficult and the transaction seems rather complicated). I'm start ing to think the guy wants to make sure I never meet him. I'm wondering if anyone has heard of a scam like this.

It is a scam. Ebay motors does not act as an escrow account.

I found that when I searched on the description of the car , I would find s omeone else selling the identical car with identical photos. In other wor ds the scam artist just copied a legit listing and used it with lower price s.

Several times the scammer would say he had free shipping because of being m ilitary. One said the car was in Alaska. But when I said I would be in A laska visiting my sister next week, the scammer disappeared. In other word s there was no car in Alaska to see.

Dan

Trusting your "gut" works pretty well if it seems like bullshit it probably is.

Walk early, walk often. I've probably walked out on legit deals too from time to time just because the situation seemed odd. But number of times I've seriously regretted later "Oh man, I really shouldn't have walked on that one"?: never. There are lots of cars in the world.

Do a search on " Used Vehicle Ebay Scam ".

Dan

Yeah, I get it now. No need to pile on, lol.

I am curious how he is going to ask me for the money. Once you involve eBay I would expect the money to be paid through them which has guarantees and I can put it on my credit card that has even better guarantees.

Rick C.

I would expect him to have some reason to not use Ebay or a credit card , but only after he thinks you are thoroughly hooked. If you have the time , you could play along and find out.

Dan

Yes. But it can go right too, I just got a big pile of stuff for about a tenth its value, and have done that many times in life.

NT

rote:

eBay I would expect the money to be paid through them which has guarantees and I can put it on my credit card that has even better guarantees.

but only after he thinks you are thoroughly hooked. If you have the time , you could play along and find out.

We'll see. He said to expect to hear from eBay tomorrow morning.

I recall getting a phone call from some scammers who wanted you to let them in your computer after they told you they were from microsoft and you had a virus infection. I played along until it came to the point of actually l etting them in. I had read about this scam just a couple days before and t hey would make you pay a couple hundred to "fix" your problem. The person who was writing about it let them have access to a virtual machine which wa s safe. The scammer had him go to a system directory and then told him all those files were viruses. When he showed them he knew they were scammers the scammer deleted a bunch of files. lol! Even if he hadn't been in a vi rtual machine the deleted files could be recovered easily enough.

I just want to see what this guy says that will make him think he'll convin ce me to send him money. I'm actually just disappointed that I can't seem to find a damn vehicle. I guess I'll need to go to a dealer. Of the half dozen or so ads I've responded to this was the only guy to reply.

Rick C.

tenth its value, and have done that many times in life.

Yeah, it happens, but this is clearly a scam. Even if he was leaving the c ountry, selling this vehicle for $2000 is rediculous. He must be able to f ind someone to pay him that much without all the nonsense of ebay shipping of a truck within the same state if there were such a thing!

Rick C.

If it's too good to be true, it probably isn't...

significantly under market price. The guy has been a bit hard to reach not answering his phone and the recording talks about "the text mail subscribe r". Not sure if that is just a generic voice mail greeting or if that is s pecific to some service that you might use to screen calls.

ed a couple of emails now with the same photos. His story is that he is sh ipping out in a couple of days and needs to sell the truck fast. He talks about the truck being shipped to me by eBay motors so I can check it out. Not sure if it will have tags or not (I wouldn't think so) so I can drive i t on the road. He say he is in the same state as me at some military base. I am central so there aren't any military bases I know of that would be o ut of driving range. I've asked which base he is on, we'll see if he will tell me.

ions seem difficult and the transaction seems rather complicated). I'm sta rting to think the guy wants to make sure I never meet him. I'm wondering if anyone has heard of a scam like this.

You might want to attend an auction, should change your mind. Outside of auctions not all sellers know what they're doing, and some just don't care & can't be bothered. I just got a big pile of stuff for nearly nothing. Probably worth 4 figures .

NT

My son got involved in the same sort of scam, the business of shipping the car to him for approval. This makes NO SENSE, as shipping a car costs serious money. We held off for a couple days until it became totally clear it was a scam.

Does your email reader allow you to see the full headers? Mine uses ctrl/U to bring up the message headers. In that you may find the IP address he is sending from. You can then use the whois service to see who owns that range of IP addresses. If he says he is in the US, but his IP address is registered to Vietnam or something, it ought to be obvious it is a scam.

Jon