Real or Fake
Summary: A participant inquired about the legitimacy of a vehicle sale involving eBay Motors and relocation to Austin, TX. Several contributors, including jonathanbrightlight, stephenmorgan, and lady_madonna, confirmed it is a scam, pointing out inconsistencies like eBay's process and the lack of an item number. They advised stopping communication, reporting the ad, and emphasized that this resembles common online scams.
Because of my job I was relocated in Austin, TX and the vehicle is already at the shipping company here, ready for delivery. Shipping costs are covered. For safety, I’ll use eBay Motors for the transaction. This program lets you test and inspect the car for 5 days before they pay me. If you decide not to keep it, you can return it at my expense, but I’m confident that won’t be the case. Delivery usually takes 2–3 days, and you’ll receive all documents with it (title, bill of sale, service records, etc.). The title and bill of sale are notarized and signed. If interested, please reply with your full name and delivery address (street, city, state, zip). eBay will then contact you with instructions, and I’ll initiate the transaction.
More pics: https://postimg.cc/gallery/yzHLBVd
Can anyone tell me if this is a scam or legitimate?
mudshark61369
·6 days ago@andreww-5 ,
"Because of my job I was relocated in Austin, TX and the vehicle is already at the shipping company here, ready for delivery. Shipping costs are covered. For safety, I’ll use eBay Motors for the transaction. This program lets you test and inspect the car for 5 days before they pay me..."
Let me guess, before what you posted above there was a bit of a sob story and the price of the vehicle is a very low one, for it. probably below $2,500. That is one of the oldest online scams!!
eBay does not have holding facilities, they do not ship cars for sellers or hold titles for them, and they do not offer a 5-7 day inspection period. Were you to respond to the listing, eventually
you would be asked to buy Gift cards to pay for it and to give the seller the card ID # and redemption code, at which time the seller would stop responding. You would not be able to recoup your loss, because gift cards are untraceable just like cash.
kathiec
·6 days agoAny ad found on a site other than eBay that claims eBay will handle the sale is a scam. This is a very old scam that catches new suckers every day. I'm glad you had sense enough to ask before you got taken.
pickapaper
·6 days ago@andreww-5
I'm so glad you came here to ask about this before you turned over your money, because it is a scam. You saw the "relocation" scam; there are also the "spouse died", "they were deployed", and I can't remember the others.
What is really sad is the number of people who already fell for these scams, for which there is no way to ever get their money back. We don't know how many, but I know a lot of people have come on here and posted that they fell for one of the scams and lost their money.
mantle1951
·6 days agoRead the first sentence: Should be a lot more info and details before putting that sentence down.
lady_madonna
·6 days ago · EditedFAKE FAKE FAKE FAKE
Ebay does not "handle" vehicle sales that are found elsewhere on the internet. Ebay does NOT contact the buyer for their information.
Stop all communication with the thief trying to steal your money and report the fake ad to whatever website you used to find the vehicle advertised.
Ebay warns of this scam here: https://pages.motors.ebay.com/buy/security/index.html
bennotbill
·1 week agoIf it's really on ebay there will be an item number so it can be viewed on ebay.
Going by your post that doesn’t seem to be the case.
So it is a scam.
stephenmorgan
·1 week ago · EditedDoes it really sound legitimate to you?
Reads like a scam to me. Has nothing to do with eBay,
jonathanbrightlight
·1 week agoScam.
If you don't do the entire process start to finish (including finding it in the first place) on eBay, it's not actually through eBay, and that is not how it works.