*** Warning about boat selling online ***

Presentation

Presentation

Well-Known Member
TECHNICAL Contributor
Oct 3, 2006
4,404
Wisconsin - Winnebago Pool chain of lakes
Boat Info
280 Sundancer, Westerbeke MPV generator
Engines
twin 5.0's w/BIII drives
I have received several scam offers and thank goodness I have not become a victim with the exception being wasting my time.

Note: I am not listed with the owner of this site and am only posting this in hopes of warning others. If word gets around and we prevent victims then the scammers will not make money and hopefully will move on.

I had been in back and forth emails with a potential buyer. He seemd to ask all the reasonable questions, requesting photos, details about the boat, etc.

Until I got the below email I thought he was real. I have now had 5 out of 5, or 100% of the people that contacted me via my online ad want to buy my boat but……every time for one reason or another they wish to pay me too much and I am to pay someone else the difference. In the case below the difference was to be paid to a 3rd party carrier for shipping.

Below is an actual email I got yesterday. After the buyer emailed me with interest and me replying with pictures, more details, etc, back and forth, he makes me an offer. Long story short I agree on a price and I sent him an acceptance email.

I just got his reply. He now claims he’s an ‘agent’ and, well, you can read the below.

My reason for posting this is a warning so others do not fall victim to this scam. I didn’t, thank goodness.

What did I learn form having this happen several times?

1) The interested party will not give their phone number
2) The interested party will not give you their address/location
3) They don’t even ask when they can come see it. If you were going to buy a boat wouldn’t you want to see it first?
4) They come back with some reason why they will send you more money then your agreed price and you have to pay someone else the difference.

Also, why would someone in another country, supposedly a wealthy person, need to get a boat all the way from Wisconsin? Oh, and, trying to swallow some pride in my own boat here, why would a wealthy person in another country want a 8 year old boat of this small size?


From: ANDREW NELSON [mailto:andrewnelson_boat@yahoo.com]
Sent: Thursday, November 09, 2006 1:19 PM
To: Douglas XXXX
Subject: PAYMENT/SHIPPING/PICK UP ARRANGEMENT............



Hello ,

I have forwarded all your Boat information to my client for him to release the fund to you, due to time constraint on the fact that he is always a busy Man.

I'm delighted to tell you that he appreciate your concern and has commended your Boat with full interest,My client is willing to carry on with this transaction, You are hereby inform that payment will get to you in an amount of $29,600 which cover's the cost of your boat and amount for shipment.He have also instructed his Financial Institution to release the fund. So you are required to deduct the cost of your boat $23,000 when payment gets to you and refund balance $6,600 to our agent ( the shipper ) for him to be able to offset shipping payment, tax charges and other cosmetic repair costs if any.

After payment has reached you and balance sent to shipper, the shipper's agent will come for inspection, pick up of boat & signing of title papers, make some cosmetic touches if there is need for it and drive to a prepaid shipper to be shipped to the approve destination.

Please confirm your acceptance by sending to me your FULL NAME, ADDRESS AND PHONE NUMBER, for payment to be issued out to you asap. All other information needed in completion of this transaction will be communicated to you in due time.

We look forward to have your information for payment to be made to you;

NAME:.............
ADDRESS:..........
PHONE:............

Your honesty, understanding and co-operation will be highly
appreciated.

Have a blessed day.

Andrew........
 
I had the same thing happen to me when selling an item on craigslist. It was supposedly a person that was traveling on business in Europe but wanted to buy my item. They would mail me a certified check for 2k more than the sale and I was supposed to send them the difference. I researched the scam and found out that people were sending fake cerified checks from out of the country and you could even be prosecuted for cashing it.....I reported it, but their is alot going on out there. Be very careful!!
 
Just another word of caution on 'Certified or Cahsier's ' checks in general.. I have a friend that sold a motor home to the tune of $75000 to someone just across state lines and ... you probably guessed it... bogus check..so it's not just overseas scams. :smt018 and they haven't recovered the motor home either.

"Your honesty, understanding and co-operation will be highly
appreciated.

Have a blessed day. " Don't you just love those last lines..sighh
 
:smt043 :lol: :smt043 :lol:
These are far to common and the above would have been my reply.
Glad you didn't take the bite and you're not reporting here how you lost $6600.00

:smt038
 
It's called the Nigerian Scam or forms of it ... you can Google to get more info on this very common scam. All web ads and eBay listings are affected.
 
One of my customers got caught up in it. Lost a expensive racing motor. :smt009 Same time of scam. Over sent money, sent motor and change back, cashiers check bounced to the moon. :smt089 He was crying about it for 2 years.
 
In our brokerage efforts we do have to deal with that quite a bit. Sometimes what seems like a scam is actually legit though. Our brokerage customers are insulated from all this. Certain sites we advertise on seem to attract the scammers. Got to be careful out there.
 
Using Money Orders from the U.S. Postal Service

While it's probably not applicable to purchasing a boat or something that large, I received good advice about using money orders from the U.S. Post Service to make purchases on online services such as Ebay and Craigslist. As it happens, when you pay with a money order from the U.S. Postal Service, if the reciepent does not comply as agreed upon, it becomes a case of mail fraud. I have a friend who has twice turned in a complaint to the USPS when an ebay deal or similar went wrong and both times it was quickly resolved quickly when the postal inspectors contacted the offending party about committing mail fraud.

I haven't had to test it yet myself, but I have switched to using USPS money orders when and where appropriate.
 
Had a similar experience on ebay when selling our jet boat - my first tip off was the obviously very bad use of the English language from someone who claimed to be from England - so I casually mentioned this and asked where he was from - he got very annoyed. Then when in insisted he make a downpayment thru paypal I got the whole "my client for tax reasons needs this to be paid to his shipper" Yeah, RIGHT. Why I mentioned the lack of knowledge of writing in English is that EVERY example I've seen since then has had the same broken English - not that this alone is a fair reason to suspect someone but evidently from what my bank manager friend tells me lots of this money goes out of the country and NOT to England.
 
Well thanks. I logged on tonight to see if there was any new and exciting Sea Ray info. out there, followed this link and have just blown and entire hour!

I recieved a lot of these e-mail scams at my office years ago. I wish I had had the time and foresight to do what this guy has done. Was one of the funniest reads I have had in a long time.

Yes off topic, but still was a great diversion.

:smt043 :smt043 :smt043
 
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