99% sure it's a scam, but I could be wrong!

Never heard of this approach to separate you from your money, and my friend thinks it's for real, but he is the trusting type.

A little background info, I have my GT up for sale, asking $10,000 CDN ($39.95 USD) :) with ads in 2 places, autotrader and Kijiji, both have contact numbers in the ads.

So I got a phone call from a guy saying he;s from a auto brokerage firm here in the city and they match up buyers and sellers, and handle the lending of money to the buyers, and he has a buyer lined up for my GT willing to pay $11,000, with 4 interested parties waiting in the wings if the first one falls thru. but because they are using him as the middle man they can not contact me direct, they can only contact other members of the service, all I have to do is sign up and pay the $299 handling fee.

Red flags go flying through the air! Wow 5 people wanting to buy my car sight unseen and for more money than I'm asking. But they can not contact me direct to ask about the car, even though my contact info is in the ads?

Anyone else smell a rat? T least this guys local and not from Nigeria.

On the other hand my trusting friend is trying to tell me there are such firms that go around finding cars that match a buyers pre-set criteria, kinda like a match maker for cars and drivers. I can see this service for higher priced cars and for people with little time to do the leg work, but my MG is not a high priced car and if you don't have time to look for one, the chances of you having time to fix and drive are even smaller.

Real firms collect from their client. This is a scam.

Yup SCAM, we have the same one here in the states.. If the buyers want your car then they will find you.

Or you can pay the money to them and then the "buyers" will be found to not qualify for credit....

I'll give you $39.95 USD for your GT :)

I'll go $40

omextreme Wrote:

Monty Python said it best: "Scam, scam, scam, scam!!!" Or words to that effect. :D

tell the guy you have his $299 and you will meet him at the Police Station to close the deal, for photographs.....see if he's still interested...

have a little more fun before you shoot him down, ask for verifiable references with phone numbers and call a few. But seller does n ot pay buyer pays

Small world, I got a bunch of the same kind of phone calls when I posted my '96 gmc pickup on Craigslist recently. Scam. Why the hell would these "buyers" need a middle man, they can't dial a phone?

Absolutely a scam-e-roo. It would be fun to ask to meet him and turn him in to the cops, but probably he'd only be liable if he'd cheated you. And he hasn't done that. Yet.

There are brokers like this, but he'd have to show me some very strong references, including a bank I could call to verify his accounts were in good standing, and so on, before I'd even consider talking to him. And the "handling fee" is a joke. A real broker will match you up with a seller and have you pay the fee at the same time money changes hands. It's like a dating service -- you pay up front and get nothing in return.
Uh, no, I've never actually tried that.

Lots of people fish for suckers by calling up high value car sellers and offering their services as a middle man, only to walk off with your money.

The freaky part is He asked for me by name when he called. Nowhere in any of the ads is my name mentioned. So I questioned the publication I posted the Ad in, asking if they sold the information to 3rd parties. And the phone number is my cell, which is not listed, so he couldn't have got my name from looking up the number.

I'm waiting to see what the Autotrader says about how he got his information!

Scam, scam, scam...they always try to be personal.

Autotrader SUCKS. They will sell your personal information to anybody.

I made the mistake of putting an ad on their website once and got about 40 calls from scammers and "brokers" who wanted to rip me off.

DO NOT USE AUTOTRADER. After pulling my ad from autotrader I found they had sold my 'for sale' information to a number of other shady cars for sale websites, I could not remove the ads from their sites.

You should edit your AT ad and put in huge letters at the bottom, "NO BROKERS OR WHOLESALERS, NO EXCEPTIONS".

Tell the broker that you'll be glad to pay him his fee once one of his clients buys the car for $11K. Tell him you'll even put it in writing! He'll leave you alone after that. :D

Shawn

Tell him that you'll be happy to pay the $299....
That is if he'll accept a check drawn on your Nigerian bank account for $1000 and refund the balance of $701 in cash upon reciept of your check........lmao

Michael

Mike B Wrote:

I'd tell him you got in an accident, and collected the insurance settlements in cash. You're selling the car because you can't drive, and you'll double his 'finder's fee' in cash if he'd stop by and drop off the list of buyers! Now that would be fun!

I like Michael's idea.