Buying a car sight unseen...

[mudski]

So we are madly looking for a car for the daughter. What she wants is a king or dual cab ute, Navara, Colorado type thing, with a tray not a tub with some fruit. But the type of car is not why I'm here.
We've found a gem, but its on the Gold Coast. The seller has sent a lot of pics, his communication to both me and my daughter is impeccable, and has uploaded two 8 minute youtube vids. The car has been taken care of, the accessories on it are not your cheap Kings stuff. Every "bolt on" is quality, It looks real good. The car is too hard to pass up really.

The seller has offered to drive it down to Melbourne, if we offer his asking price, which even at that is still pretty reasonable considering what is around and what we have seen.

The issue is, he wants a deposit, 10% I think, only fair on his behalf, but this kind of sets the alarm bells going.

So other than flying up there myself. Whats the safest way to do this to ensure we don't lose our deposit, if this is not legit?

Cheers.

[jay see]

Maybe a local mobile mechanic, get him to do an inspection. At least you know someone have actually seen and touched the car.

Sent from my CPH1921 using Tapatalk

[rusty_nail]

Give me a.bell.mate

Sent from my SM-G988B using Tapatalk

[Plasnart]

Mate this would be my plan:

1. Find somewhere in SE QLD to potentially store the car for a few weeks.
2. Fly up personally. If you don’t like it fly home. If it’s a good thing and all legit, negotiate a deal to cover your airfares if possible, buy it, do the paperwork and take it to your storage location and fly home.
3. Fly back on a Friday evening after work and drive it home by Sunday pm.
4. Expect big hugs from the daughter.

He could be totally legit, but what rang my alarm bell is that he offered to drive it all the way to Melbourne for free to sell it to you. If it is such a great vehicle why would he offer to do that? It should sell itself in his local region.

I don’t trust anyone online any more when it comes to $$$.

Good luck mate I hope it all comes good for you.

[Cremulator]

I agree, the fact that there is an offer to drive it to you sounds a little suspect.
I have freighted a car from Perth to Melbourne and it cost about $800, but it was purchased from a used car dealer.

For piece of mind with a private sale, I would get a 100 point inspection done, if it's all ok then fly there and drive it back or freight it and fly home.

What you really have to consider is this: would you be happy spending $x to fly up and make sure it's legit in person, or potentially losing $x to a scammer and starting again.
If those numbers are close to each other it'll cost you the same whichever choice you make

[Pete49]

Be very cautious as scamming is rife and a good scammer will do all that you mentioned and more. I would ask if its ok for a mate to come round to look at it, this will be the cruncher. My BiL tried to buy a car there but kept getting told 'yep its good' 'ok what's the address' and it all went downhill from there. Take into account most say GC but often mean Logan or other outer Brissie suburbs. Hope its not but beware.

[mihit]

Hell. Y'all got me worried now. The hell's gone wrong with the world??

But thinking about it, A 20 hour drive for free is a bit suspicious, Unless he's way over priced it.

And if you "sell" 10% of a car 10 times...

How does he want payment? Actual bank account? Bitcoins? phone cards?

Not sure if there's an escrow service locally that you could employ...

[mudski]

Thanks to everyone.
I’m confident this guy is legit. I just spoke with him, he gave me is physical address, did a street view search and the address matches the photos given. When I said I will fly up he was happy to even pick us up for the airport.
He has also agreed to knock off $1000 on the asking price. Without handing over a deposit.
If he was sus, I think he’d be wanting money up front.
My daughter even spent time stalking him on all media sites and with good success, everything he’s been talking about on his pages and what he’s been doing to his car/s, line up with what he’s currently shown us.
Not locked in but we’ll be probably be flying up Saturday morning, if we are happy, we buy it and drive it home, if not. We walk away and fly home and look for another car.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[rusty_nail]

Thanks to everyone.
I’m confident this guy is legit. I just spoke with him, he gave me is physical address, did a street view search and the address matches the photos given. When I said I will fly up he was happy to even pick us up for the airport.
He has also agreed to knock off $1000 on the asking price. Without handing over a deposit.
If he was sus, I think he’d be wanting money up front.
My daughter even spent time stalking him on all media sites and with good success, everything he’s been talking about on his pages and what he’s been doing to his car/s, line up with what he’s currently shown us.
Not locked in but we’ll be probably be flying up Saturday morning, if we are happy, we buy it and drive it home, if not. We walk away and fly home and look for another car.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

gonna be an awesome daddy daughter road trip

[Winnie]

Good idea Mark, I'd hate to hear about you getting ripped off on the 1% chance.
Will be a very fun trip for the two of you!

Sent from my SM-S916B using Tapatalk