Beware of second chance offers on ebay

[americanbadass]

ok...So yesterday I open my morning emai, and there is a second chance offer on a VW trike I bid on a month ago. It looked totally legit,had the ebay home page the trike, pics and full listing. I bid 13200.00 on a California Trike, really nice, custom flame paint, just a sweet looking brand new unit easily worth 20K OR higher. The bidding stopped at 13200.00 "reserve not met". I was as excited as a maggot on a gut wagon-even started lookin for money, you know diggin holes in the back yard for spare change so to speak. I even had a story fabricated , so the warden wouldn't kill me( already have a bike, trike and a vintage hot rod).
It took me about 3 hours to figure out how I would pay for it, and of course to fabricate the story. I was ecstatic, xmas in September!!! So I email them back to ask a few questions and see if they were legit (it looked official).
Got an email back asking for a paypal deposit to hold it till I could get the funds. Something inside told me to give it overnite, and call them in the morning. Called them (California trikes) and not only did they sell the bike, but never give second chance offers. It was all a scam and in my excitement I came this close ( ) to giving them a five hundred dollar deposit-hell they even had a fake PayPal page!!!!
Needless to say I am a little butthurt and just pissed about it. The moral of this story-if it sounds to good to be true it AIN'T!

[BladeRunner]

We have a site up here..in Toronto Canada called kijiji..(I'm sure it's in many other places too)....that a scamer has been quite busy on "selling" motorcycles for next to nothing, clearly the prices are VERY attractive, usually about HALF of what it should be!
I followed up on a couple of them. Turns out this "woman" typically claims to have the bike from a divorce settlement that WAS her husbands. She doesn't need it..thus the cheap price.
When you ask where you can look at it, because it's fairly close to me... suddenly it's in Alaska!!..."all crated up & ready to ship to your location as soon as the "shipping fees" are paid"..huh??.. the price varies,but usually "she" is looking for $600~$1000 before it will ship....always very nice pics of the different bikes...but funny thing; she claims she is in England..but if you click on the map location..it ALWAYS shows the same downtown location in (within a few blocks) Toronto. I've seen late model Harleys, GoldWings etc going for $6~$7K...so you really have to have your eyes open..never send money & never give any details of your bank accounts credit cards etc...see it in person..then check some more!!!...they are out there every day scamming people..!!

[bayoudave]

I don't purchase anything from ebay. Seen way too many scams. Friend bought a boat. When it came it was a toy boat and when he looked at the pics he could see that it looked just like the pics so real looking. When he called the police they asked if he got a boat and did the ad say it was real or toy. When he told them that it didn't say he just assumed it was real they told him he just bought an expensive toy.

[Chazzman]

Glad you waited to send money, there are scams everywhere. I found a good deal on a BMW in Atlanta, it was exactly the bike I was looking for so I call and speak with the seller offering him a grand less, he jumps on it. Hmmm seemed strange since the bike was priced 2K too cheap anyway. I made arrangements to drive to Atlanta on a Saturday and pick the bike up. He said the banker had to get the title from NC, humm very strange so I call the banker and he has the same accent as the seller, said he would have the title Saturday.

I asked for the vin # and started calling BMW dealerships in Atlanta, I had the Service Manager run the vin and he found only a couple warranty repairs and said everything looked good. I asked he give me the purchaser as listed. He gave me a name fortunately I googled it and found a phone number. I called and asked if he was the previous owner, he said yes why, I said well I am buying the bike and he said you buying it from the insurance company, I totalled the bike a year ago.

The title had been sent to another state and what is called washed, once back to GA it does not show a rebuilt title...

Sorry for the long post

[Rsw]

Have you done any research on those trikes? There frames are made in Taiwan and anyone I have heard that has bought one says they are junk. There’s a guy that has been trying to sell a used one and he can’t even come close to getting a far price for it. I called them out on running the bids up with the same guy bidding. They told me that they have a price they want out of them and that’s how they get it close to the buy it price.