whats with all these "buy it now" scams on e-bay?

I've been seeing all these frame off restored rides on e-bay latley with a Buy it now price of $7,500 or $9,700 but you must be approved before bidding.....Are these scams that people are running or are these legit auctions because i do see that people are bidding on them?? Anybody know anything about these? If they are scams, How does the scam work?...

 

Its not a scam, its just like it sounds Buy it now thats all. If the seller is willing to let something go to the auctions end, the highest wins. It might say buy it now 50$ but thats usually a little higher for people that don't want to wait, the seller might be willing to sell it for 35$ but is just hoping to get more.
I just saw this brass belt buckle the other day that Iwanted to usIe
as a brake pad, it was listed buy it now $49 I made an offer of $10
then the guy Emailed me a counter-offer of $30. But hey there's all kinds out there. You could find out about the seller before you buy too.
So far I've only bought a few things I haven't sold any thing yet.
I did order 4 cadillac sombrero hubcaps for $47 plus $20 shipping from Florida and they were sweet. Plus it was fun to outbid somebody last minute for something you want. Give it a shot. Hope this helps. Late. Trashed & Hammered

 

There's a combination of things at work here. And Vehicle auctions are a lot different from parts auctions.

Scammers want you to send payment for a car that doesn't exist, outside of eBay, or they use an account they stole so it's not connected to them. If you need to be approved for bidding per terms set only in the description and you're directed to an e-mail address in the description, it's a scam.

Other times they hide code in the description to take you to a phony login page so they can steal your password and use your account to list more fake auctions.

eBay took away the option to limit or require approval for bids for almost everyone, except in special circumstances, but even when it was allowed, it had to say so at the top of the auction page, as part of the text eBay puts up, to be a legitimate approval only bidding auction. If nothing stops you from actually placing a bid, it's not a legit approval only auction.

They always want you to pay for the item Western Union or other money transfer, so you can't get it back and can't really trace who picked it up. Generally, if one guy in 5,000 listings pays off, they make a few grand for very little work, that's why they do it.

Another common part to the scam is to claim they're in one place and the car is elsewhere, usually one or the other is overseas somewhere.

I don't know why people bid on them except to take the Buy It Now away. Maybe they're dumb enough to believe a too-good-to-be-true listing. They may also be other hijacked accounts, used to help fool you into thinking the auction is legitimate. 95 times out of 100, you can search in past auctions and find the same car was listed not long before, by the real seller, and it may have sold for thousands more than the BIN. One classic was a '61 Chrysler 300-G convertible, a $60,000 car, that kept popping up with an $8500 BIN - the pictures were all stolen and the listings were on hijacked accounts.

A car with a too good to be true Buy it Now price, is almost always going to be a scam. There aren't that many pissed-off ex-wives, or soon to be ex-wives, purposely selling the cheating husband's hotrod for a giveaway price.

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I run eBay store auctions set to require approval to bid, but eBay took that option away in March - apparently they do not plan to change existing auctions, and the store auctions just keep relisting as-is, so I am safe for now. I set them up that way because in the eBay store, you have to use a Buy It Now price, and scammers would come along and end the auction and then try to get me to fall for the nigeria scam, where they send me a phony cashier's check for more than the amount of the car. Since Store listing fees are a bunch more than regular auctions, I leave them set to approval. Even though I have had a few idiots who couldn't understand it. One clown tells me it's too much work to tell me which cars he wants to bid on when I explain I cannot just give him blanket approval to bid, because eBay did not set it up that way.

The funny thing is that because I can't go in and approve one person to bid or even take approval off, to sell something listed that way I have to relist it for the bidder as a regular auction. Well, if I do that, I'm going to set it up as a non-store item and pay the cheaper final listing fees.

Thats the problem with eBay now that it's so big - you have to fight scammers from everywhere, wether you are a buyer or a seller.

 

Frame off restore for $7500???? Is that a frame off restoration of an 84 Tercel? Sounds weird to me.

 

Check it out! Go on e-bay and look at some of the more popular cars like for instance... There is a 58 Impala Convertible (frame off resto) on there for $9,200 Buy it now..... C'mon!

 

It's obvious you haven't seen the auctions i am talking about, I know what the "Buy it now" option is there for and yes i too have bought stuff BIN ...But if you read "Rusty New Yorker's" post you'll get educated on exactly the scams i'm talking about..

 

people bid on them just for fun, but some bid thinking they will get a 75,000 car for 6700 bucks. one this evening was bid up to one million dollars.. I assume to spoil the scammers scheme.

these scammers are busy little bastards. there was a guy who had like 15 cars running on stolen accounts. they all had 87oo ("o" instead of zero) in the title as the price. couple times a day I'd search 87oo and report them. they'd be gone soon enough, but then he can contact the bidders and make an outside ebay deal. they all have some shitty story to tell, and they all speak what I refer to as scammers english. very easy to spot.

don't want to get ripped off? never buy a car you can not go see in person and take with you when you go. not that smart? never pay for a car with western union. never buy a car where the word agent is in the email. never buy a car where they say ebay will hold the funds until you approve of the car. never buy a car with free shipping from another country, the list goes on and on

 

They are scams. Alot of people bid on them knowing they are scams. They may bid $100K on some because it's sort of fun to bid an amount that high knowing that the auction will get closed before long.

Save one of them and watch how long it lasts. Not long generally. Look at them also. They are all set up very similiar. Usually a gmail email address also.

They hope to post 500 of them with the idea of getting that one sap to send them the money.

 

I saw a report on 20/20 or a show like that about these guys. There were about 20 guys sitting around a room on computers. They were all either setting up the phoney listings, or replying to ads. They were asked if they thought what they were doing was right, and they basically had the attitude that if people were dumb enough to fall for it, they should get scammed! It also almost sounded like their government was supporting their actions. And that our government can't really do anything about it. The story ended with the old "Buyer Beware" line.

 

They're all scams. Go to the eBay Motors discussion board and read the sticky posts at the top.

These scams work for one reason, and one reason only: Joe Greedy thinks he's gonna get a $60,000 car for $6,500. If people weren't trying to get something for nothing, scams wouldn't work.

Anyone savvy enough to have a computer and get on eBay knows the true value of his fully restored classic car.

 

Seems like there are nothing but scams going on nowadays. I guess the internet has just made it that much easier for those snakes to snake people out of their money. Makes me paranoid to use my credit card sometimes, and those damn "Dateline Reports" about internet scams only add to the fear factor. Yikes.

 

part of the scam is when you have to sign in to the bogus auction ....your info is being hacked....i had a dragster for sale a couple months ago....someone sent me a question to seller stating that there was another auction with my car being listed.....i scanned the whole message ....but clicked on the bogus link....and signed in ...later that morning the auction i had for the dragster was ended early by someone else...and second chance offers were sent to the bidders...ironically , i had one of the bidders that was going to buy the car early ...and called to tip me off to this 2nd chance deal....major pain in the ass , to straighten out all of the confusion...but on a good note ....he still bought the car.. brandon

 

craigslist is just as bad. anything from old cars, airstreams, new cars, etc all with a price like $2900 or $9200.

 

It works like this:


BUY THIS NOW: $863 USD


I will sell this car that is gold to you for right now my mother has sick and money is to be needed for doctor. I am need $863 US Dollar for her to be fix again.
The good doctor says to sell this now and for $863 US Dollar wired to me will make mother dance once more again.


Sound too good to be true?

 

Sounds awful!!!

 

I just saw a 41 willys coupe on there for "buy it now" $9,000.00
Give me a friggin break...............
If anyone falls for that they are just stupid...............

 

Is that fully restored blue '32 3Window for $7,500.00 still being listed? I like to know of a quick way to report these "auctions"to eBay. The Buy it Now option is a great feature too bad it is being used by scammers.

 

I say for $863 US Dollar she better do more than DANCE!!!!!!!!!

 

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels? CLASSIC! haha!

 

look up ebola monkey man,.... guy just messing with scammers. Pretty funny shit (may be offensive to some veiwers)

 

If you watch the listings constantly, you will see cars relisted at a Buy-It-Now price that's too good to be true. They do this by stealing the pictures. Sometimes the same car will appear on ebay at the same time with a true price and a Buy-It-Now price. During these times, I'll will PM the legitimate seller and advise him.
A friend of mine fell for one of these scams and wired $10k. Ebay could not help him. However, his wife would not let it rest. She scoured other auto auctions and found the car listed again. Posing as a buyer, she PM'd the crook. Based on e-mail addresses, she found out that he was in Germany. She then told him who she was and demanded the money be refunded or she would turn her findings over to Interpol. She got the money the next day. A few days later, the crook hacked into their computer and erased the harddrive.

 

I saw a 64 Ford and a 28 Ford with the same BS scam on Ebay. But if you check in to it they aren't even on Ebay, Its only to get your info and your money and the only thing you get is take'n to the cleaners. Get a Rope!!!

 

hey dude! i just browsed your computer and i would erase your hard drive before i send that stuff to your ol' lady, she's gonna be pissed! LOL!

 

Just read it. Those auctions you mention do sound Fishy. Good 411 Thanks

 

Hmm...never run into this on e-bay... Maybe that's because the cars I buy, are all under the "Parts Cars" listing in Ebay Motors. Oh, damn! I think I just gave away my secret...

 

I found out yesterday just how easy it is for someone to hack into your ebay and run these scams. Someone hacked into my shit, listed 9 ATV's and snowmobiles, totaling $600 in listing fees. Ebay recognized it was a scam and credited it all back, but I have no clue how they did it.

 

When I find one of these too good to be true listings I tell them that I live in the same town as them, I have the cash and I am ready to meet them at the Police Dept. They never respond.

 

For those selling a car getting Nigerian crooks fishing for suckers, play along and have them send the check to Eddie Van Halen at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

Maybe after the White House has opened 20,000 bogus checks they would make some effort to get the host countries do something about this.

 

Sometimes they are SCAMS --people trying to gather personal information from you, telling you they need this stuff to approve you to bid.... BE CAREFUL!!! Don't get involved.

 

It's a cruel, cruel world!