Viper Scam on Ebay

[farrbar]

I was looking at e-bay and someone has listed a 2001 GTS w/ 1500 miles saying that they would do the deal for $35K!!! They also say that they must get paid via paypal, as they are part owner of the company.

To anyone who bids on this car, I would like to point out the following:

1) This guy has listed his Viper as a 12 Cyl.
2) This guy has no e-bay history, I find it hard to believe that the owner of Paypal has no e-bay history since that is the only real source of customers for paypal.

Oh yeah, the guy also says he has no problem prosecuting bidders that don't pay!! Anyone who has spare time should bid on this, and were he to show you a "like new" Viper (oh must be a 12 Cyl one!!!) I would think that it would be worth 35K. Also, he encourages people to call him. Might I suggest calling and telling him what a Jacka$$ he is, just my .02, Actually instead of calling him, try to fax something to his phone number, it won't go through, but I know my fax would attempt 100 times before it stops bothering him.

Morale of the story: If you want a used to Viper go to one of the dealers that supports VCA (they all advertise on this site)

-Buyer Beware

Farrbar
2001 RT/10 - Yellow (Just in time to qualify for SRT-10)
1994 RT/10 - Black (great car, avail. for sale)

 

[Cam]

I like the send him a fax idea.. LOL

 

[SapphireGTS]

wheres the link I want to call him.

 

[Qualitywires.com]

sounds like a kid playing around.

 

[99t1]

send him the old 20 pages of black paper...the fumes will wake him up.

 

[C O D Y]

It has Cruise Control!!!!! I bet if you asked him it could have cup holders too.

The picture is from Dodges press kit.

 

[Afy]

Heaven Forbid.. he might be legit..

 

[Gus Strakes]

Take a look at the bid history, retractions are fast and furious! The price has gone from a high of ~65K down to low the 40's.

 

[SapphireGTS]

You know what. Some people buy cars to look cool. He may not know what he has under the hood. Heck he may have never driven it?

You are right he may actually be legit.

Who knows.

 

[Lee00blacksilverGTS]

I think this could be real, what it smells of is an impending divorce situation where the guy is on a real limited time frame to convert assets to cash before the judge gains control. Sevearal references to time frame and urgency. Could also be a bankrupcy deal under the new laws where the guy needs to cash out of the car quick to conceal assets and convert to cash. I used to dabble in highend offshore race boats and guys were famous for losing them in a hurry for both the above reasons. I would advertise my boat in a mag. like Powerboat because I wanted to move up to a bigger boat and would get several calls along the line of trade mine for yours but gotta do it in 36 hours due to divorce settlement etc. tremendous deals offered and in retrospect maybe should have acted on them, I was always too wary about getting involved with the druggie stuff that was sometimes involved with guys that had this kind of boat. The fact remains this could be a guy trying to liqudate his assets for a number of reasons. If I was in the market for a gts I would sure as heck call him.

 

[ACR Larry]

If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and looks like a duck, it must be a duck. This kid is a quack!

Or in other words,

If it looks to good to be true, it probably is.

Since I am on a roll, how about this; I have this bridge that I have to unload quick! Interested?

The auction is actually very funny. I especailly like this part
"I am 58 now so who knows when Ill go."

If he really has this car and wanted to get rid of it at half price, why doesn't he just get low blue book from a dealer.

<FONT COLOR="#ff0000" SIZE="1" FACE="Verdana, Arial">This message has been edited by acr autopia on 11-30-2001 at 08:06 AM</font>

 

[silverviper]

Just a thought...hope I'm wrong, but I noticed the seller on ebay is from Alhambra, CA. Also noticed that a new member on the VCA board here "DONT TRY" is from Alhambra, CA, joined only a couple weeks ago. DONT TRY has a 2001 Yellow GTS with "no engine" listed in his signature, along with an AMG C36 "broke on me" and a 98 Civic. Again, it all just seems a bit odd for coincidence.

 

[Y2K5SRT]

Indeed, DONT TRY just posted a thread entitled "Broken engine poll" right here on the forum...

 

[C O D Y]

I told the guy I would give him his asking price and be right over to pay for it. He said YES It's yours!

I told him I would be right over to pick it up and I would pay him with paypal while standing in front of him and the car with my laptop computer. This is the email I got back...

"Im sorry sir I have business meetings all day. May we
please just finish the deal over the internet. I have
very little time on my hands. The car is currently in
my garage."


Good luck to the sap that sends him money.

 

[Gus Strakes]

After reading Cody's post, if anyone still thinks this is not a scam, please contact me. I have some beach front property in Afghanistan I need to sell right away.

 

[Casey]

Just looked into DON'T TRY, if you look at all of his posts, you would think that it's his car on Ebay!!
All of his posts have to do with his Engine and it being sent to Arrow for a rebuild after only a few miles!!
I sent him a email and he replied very quickly that it is NOT his and that his is Without a Engine, as it has been sent away to Arrow!! It's NOT DON'T TRY's car, then I would say that it
sounds like a scam to me! If it isn't I hope he let's me pick it up soon!!

 

[silverviper]

Then my sincere apologies to DONT TRY, for mistaking the coincidence. I did not intend to disrespect a legitimate owner, I was only surprised at the coincidence. I wonder how many yellow '01 GTS vipers there could be in Alhambra? Anyway, sorry if my paranoid nature went too far.

 

[Jay Herbert]

Of particular interest on this item.... after the auction closed, "Not a Registered User" appeared after the sellers name. I've never seen this before, so I looked a little further.... Here is what EBay says this means:

Not a Registered User:

A user's status may be indicated as Not a Registered User for several reasons:

If a user requests to be unregistered from eBay.
If a user is suspended from using eBay. While suspensions are rare, eBay reserves
the right to suspend users at our discretion. In most cases, we do so as a result of a user's
illegal conduct or violation of the User Agreement. If you have any question about eBay's
terms and conditions, see our User Agreement or review policies of our SafeHarbor
Team.

If you see the words, “Not a Registered User” next to an eBay member’s User ID, this means
that this person unregistered from eBay after the listing closed. Because only registered eBay
members can participate on eBay, you are not obligated to buy or sell from this person.

When a user's status is changed to Not a Registered User, all feedback left by this user remains
unaltered. Prior to 1999 however, as noted in some profiles, feedback was converted to neutral
when a user became no longer registered.

So, to summarize..... either the seller was real, got a buyer, and decided to scam EBay out of its fee, or the seller was never real.

 

[Brian Denham]

By chance I actually spoke to a bidder on the car recently. He told me that ebay called him, as he was the high bidder, and said not to send this guy any money. Ebay did infact suspend his account. As always.....buyer beware...