Just had a zero feedback member from Brazil hit the buy now option on the car.
I required a 500 deposit into paypal. He never contacted me prior to the auction
ending. Scam? Advice appreciated.

Definitely sketchy. I guess you try to contact him and wait and see if he makes a move....

Tough call. Go with your gut. You don't feel comfortable, do whatever it takes to protect yourself.

Let me know if you need a translation.

Save yourself a headache and deal locally.

Just spoke with the Ebay rep, he suggested not going through with it. Also have a local guy that wants it, whom looked at it today. Thing is, I had no
prior correspondence with the person from Brazil. Gut feeling is telling me no, due to no prior communication and him having no feedback. Have to sleep on it. Thanks for the prompt replies and advice.

Tod

If he sends real money and not a check or a promise then what's the problem? See if he carries through, you'll find out soon enough.

That being said I'd be a bit skeptical because Brazil has always been protectionist with some pretty stiff restrictions and high tariffs on car imports. They used to not permit any used car to be imported for any reason. I've heard that's been eased a bit in the last few years,but is still difficult. As long as it's not costing you anything I'd still give him the benefit of the doubt until/unless it becomes apparent it's not legit. Or until the local guy says enough's enough.

Eric can translate and if you need it I can give you advice about import/export procedures. It's been a while but things can't have changed too much.

I wish ebay had a way to enforce parameters set buy the seller.
basic stuff like: zero or negative feedback buyers need seller permission to bid.
The other big one is out of country buyers buying stuff after the seller has stated he will only ship to the the US.

I am glad to hear that Ebay was willing to deal with you on it. Good luck with the private sale!

Zach

Thanks for the offer guys. I'll send him an email out of courtesy and see how it falls into place.

Tell him, get on a plane, look at the car, hand me cash, and drive it away.

if he comes thru with the $$$ in the requisite amount of time, don't you have a contract with him to sell it to him?

If he abides by the parameters you set in the auction, and you get cold hard cash in hand, sell it to him.

With that being said, I would guess you will never see the $$$.

Jim

The payment for $500 was just made to my paypal account. I forwarded him an email regarding shipping and final payment. Other than cash, what would be the most secure means for accepting overseas payment? Should the title be sent DHL after payment, or travel with the car if it all goes through?

Thank you,

Tod

I'd send the title separate from the car. Too many chances for tom follery if the title is with the car during transport.

No clue as to how best to receive payment. Wire transfer? Trusted escrow service?

Zach

Bank-to-bank wire transfer. It's the safest way, even safer than cash, which can be phony........................ The Cap'n

Thanks Cap'n. I'll shoot over to the bank and set up a separate account.

Brazil is seeing a pretty significant resurgance of aircooled hype.
Alot of the VW ragtops have been sent there.

Labor is cheap there. They redo them and sell them into the European market. I sold three cars to Brazil recently.

I ONLY use wire transfer, never paypal, never checks when dealing with anyone on cars...in or out of the US..
Its safe, its secure, and its real time.

As far as the title goes, its needed to get the car through customs, so ask the buyer what he wants. If you have the cash, he dictates the shipping arrangements...its not your problem anymore.

Typically the title is part of the shipping documents, along with a bill of sale etc.
Most countries accept a copy of the title in the shipping documents, but the real title will be needed for the pickup at Brazil customs.
Germany requires the real title with the shipping documents... (I get duplicates for that)
Titles are near impossible to keep track of, and paperwork gets lost all the time.


Rich

Talk to your banker. These are the people who know how to guard your money. You should know your banker's name. He should be your friend. Your banker should know that if he (she) decides to move to another bank, that you will move all your accounts with him.

If you haven't established a relationship like this already, it is time to get started. Find a local bank and interview the banker. I don't care if you don't have a pile of money or not. This is one of the ways you take care of personal business.

And if you do it right, next time you overdraw your account, you won't get one of those nasty service charge letters in the mail. You'll get a freindly call asking if everythings all right or if you need some help.

I just spoke with the buyer's girl friend. They plan on shipping it to Miami first. They are working on the details she said. I set up an account for the transfer. So should be good to go. Next week I'll have my mechanic go over it once more prior to shipping to make sure everything is fine. I'll keep you all posted on the progress.

Thanks again guys, much appreciated.

Tod

My job is to post product on ebay for Remart Corp. and we definately have those parameters set up, you cannot submit a bid if you are located outside of the US, have had a certain number of negative feedback within a period of time , or nonpayment strikes on your account. Also those with 0 or 1 transactions have to have verified paypal addresses. Its nice because ebay weeds these people out for us automatically.

Ebay does have the option of having people with negative or zero feedback unable to bid. It also has the option of only people in the USA being able to bid. You can block both of the above with a check in the box when listing! I sell pretty frequently with work on ebay. I've sold internationaly before & what a PITA. So know I only sell in the USA & it works great once you have checked the appropriate boxes.

Still not a perfect system but what is

I checked that option when I was selling something but e-bay let someone from Finland buy it anyway! I never shipped it and e-bay said I had to pay the fees anyway!

FWIW there has been alot of Am. cars going south in the last feww years. We recently had a guy fropm Argentine come into town and bought up a buch ( close to ten ) local cars and had one of the shopd ship[ them for him. I personally know 3 guys that sold him 356's. CASH money he gave them. Kinda sad to see. Funny part is the last I heard ( 2 weeks ago ) ALL of the cars were sitting at a port seized by Argentinian customs because the paper work was not filled out or was filled improperly. Oh and the guy was spending invetstors money

Sold a BMW on ebay a couple of years ago to a guy in Finland. As I watched the auction close and his country pop up at its end, I thought the worst too. He was on the phone 5 minutes after the auction end. He asked me if I thought there might be a problem. I said as long as you make arrangements to pick the car up at my house. He had a truck headed to Detroit within a week where it was shipped to a container in New Jersey. The communication was good between the two of us and it was a good experience. He did make one mistake that I discouraged him in doing, but he insisted. He sent me all the money up front wiring it via western union. That's a ebay no-no. I guess he felt I was an honest guy. I also had to send the title along with the car at the request of the transport company. That seemed to be a routine procedure, which I also questioned.

Umm, did they pay you for it?

This has happened to me as well recent;y (with car and bike parts, never with anything as big or expensive as an entire care). I don't think the check boxes do anything more than add some text to the listing.

Skip

Todd,

You can very easily have him wire you the money to your bank account. You will know when the money is in there. Some times it takes 2 days to get to you or more depending on the banks involved. You need to get all the information for his bank for an international wire not just the information on a CK. Have them fax you a copy of the wire order so you know that it was really done from the bank.

Fax him a copy of the paperwork. After the Wire is in your bank the car is his. FedEx him the Pink Slip or what ever you call them in your state with the owners manuals and extra keys. There has to be some level of trust but believe me when the wire is in your bank it is your money and no one can pull it out but our government, or your state.

Bob

When I shipped my car to Australia, the title had to be with the car. U.S. Customs will need it.

Hey all, the transaction went very smooth. Was just a bit hesitant with all
the identify theft and fraud that's on the net these days. They deposited
the 1st $500 into paypal that morning. The remainder took 2 days to get
into a new checking account I set up via wire transfer. I fedex'ed them out the title. Will contact the shipping company again on Monday to confirm a pickup date.
Thanks for the advice. Brazil will have a nice little teener zipping around now.

Alright, I'll bite. I just sold my car to a guy in Sweden. I had it listed locally on Craigslist and where they SCREAM don't do wire transfers with out of country buyers. I asked him to Paypal me the money and Bam! it's here. I just have to trailer it to a shipper in Houston (not far). The shipper said I would need to hand over the title and a bill of sale (made out to the buyer). My question is why not Paypal? Just too expensive?

Expensive, and they are more sympathetic to buyers than sellers. Imagine your car on a ship, and your funds locked up by paypal.

You'll have your payment only after you've transferred it from your PayPal account to your checking account, not before.

The shipping companies need the title to prove to U.S.Customs that the car is really yours and wasn't just randomly snatched off the street for sale to export.

Actually I think there's almost zero risk in selling a car overseas, as long as you know how things work and the buyer will agree to wait whatever amount of time it takes for the check to clear, the funds to be verified, or whatever. A legitimate buyer won't have problems with waiting for the funds to clear, either, since he's already trusting your description of the car (you ARE being totally frank and honest, aren't you?) and it's going to take him more than a month to see it anyway, after ocean shipping. If you're a real zenophobe then have your favorite banker or customs agent put together a verified letter of credit through a first class U.S. bank. Will cost a couple of hundred bucks, depending on your banking relationship, but no risk whatsoever.

I've bought several 1k - 2k car parts and motors on ebay and some of the sellers said it would take a week to get their money from paypal so they were waiting on the funds to schedule shipping. Only one turned out to be a crook and probably because noone else bid and I got a seemingly good deal. After a week or ten days they still didn't send any shipping info and as soon as I asked for my money back they jumped on it and refunded the money. the kicker was that paypal charged me a fee to give my money back and the crook gave me bad feedback for being pushy. They never intended to honor the sale and just stalled. I should have known when it was a residence in a large city and they claimed they were scheduling residential pickup but the freight wasn't what I was familiar with. It was a suby motor and tranny.

FWIW. The deal is done. I just delivered to the shipper in Houston. The peace of mind I have getting the money through PayPal is worth the cost to me. I am glad they afford a high level of protection for the buyer. I have used it for a couple of years now with zero problems.

BTW Ike sure did a number on that town. I was planning on delivering last weekend but obviously that wasn't going to happen. That trip was very humbling.