The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area General Truck Talk Sold out by a Low life Seller on Ebay

Just wanted to report one more case of people with no scruples! I called a seller on Ebay ( on a tip from fellow stovebolter Spank Hardy!)who was offering a rare 1942 GMC and made a deal with him to buy his truck over teh telephone FOR TWICE HIS ASKING PRICE! He agreed and we agreed I would send a money order out the next AM to him for full payment and he woudl remove the listing asap. I did send the payment as directed within 12 hours! and he was gonna remove the truck for sale from the auction(he had already posted that the truck might be sold locally). He went away for a few days and I couldn't reach him. He never removed it from the auction! When I did call him and get through a few days later, he informed me" gee sorry... he had sold it to someone else for more cash!" Peoples word doesnt mean much any more I guess.

"Old Coes" ...still learning...
Si Lupton
Hartland Vermont :confused: :rolleyes: :confused: :confused:

Maybe HIS word. I'm a peoples. :rolleyes:

Far as i'm concerned, a person who is going to sell an item they have for auction early sucks.

You wanna sell it at auction, then let it hang out and sell it for the closing bid.. don't play two or three angles at the same time.

So I wouldn't put it past a character who will do that to do even more off color things.

Now on the same token, if I WERE to do a deal like that (which I wouldn't) I sure as heck wouldn't pull the auction till I had cash in hand. (or in PayPal). If the auction closed before I recieved the jack, sorry pal.

A deal is a deal when you shake hands or exchange cash. If that clown had your money in hand before the auction closed and didn't cancel the listing and stand by his word, then he is a snake.

Altho, again.. selling items listed on eBay "under the table" is kind of smarmy, too.. and considered "fee avoidance" and can result in getting your eBay account suspended.

It could be that he may have had second thoughts about jerking around the legitimate bidders that were competing for the winning bid. Or maybe he felt that you pressured him into a deal, and just decided that he did not want you to have it. Just because you may have offered him more money, dosen't mean that he has to accept it.

I agree a deal is a deal, whether it be a hand shake or ones word, but it sounds like he already had a local person interested before he had listed it on ebay, and who knows what he may have initially told that person. Or better yet, who the other person may have been, (possibly a relative).

He probably just felt that if he wasn't going to sell it to the highest bidder on ebay, he may as well sell it to someone he knows.

Either way, I believe that if you had outbid the others on ebay it most likely would be yours.

Just my opinion.

I agree that you shouldn't have tried to manuver around the rules. If he kept your money and it was a USPS domestic money order, contact the postal inspector. If he sent you back the money, chalk it up to lessons learned.

I'm curious.. was the final auction price higher or lower than your offer?

Are you talking about the 1942 GMC military box van listed here ?

If so, the guy DID cancel the auction as evidenced by the text The seller ended this listing early because the item is no longer available for sale.

I gotta agree with the others here --
If he "sold it out from under you", that's exactly what you had asked him to do to all of the other bidders.

Kinda like the "other woman" who's surprised when the married man she's dating cheats on her, too.

Why couldn't you just bid on the auction, like the rules (and fair play) say?

Cheers,
mark.

You did not provide all of the auction info. First: What did you offer him? Second: What did it sell for? Third: Why didn't you provide a link?

You can't buy something "locally", long distance over the phone. With auctions like that, you have to physically go there and make your cash offer.