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Most stupid message while flogging a shiter


Alan Prost

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On 2/4/2021 at 9:16 AM, Shirley Knott said:

Mixed emotions about all of this.

When I sold our 940 turbo a couple of years back I spent literally HOURS answering questions, taking more pics and even filming 'walk around' videos of the car for a host of dreamers on the other side of the country, all of whom were very cordial and used proper grammar, but ultimately made excuses and never turned up.

After a fortnight, I got a message from someone in Middlesbrough that literally said "Still got car? I wont to cum and luk 2moro" Against my better judgement I messaged back and to my amazement the chap turned up the next day and after a brief look and test drive paid in full. I still see pictures of him with the car via various Volvo Instagram feeds, he seemingly still has/loves the car two years on and they're both living their best lives together.

Meanwhile,while all this was going on, some random contacted me on eBay to ask how I "Dared" ask so much for an old Volvo and said "Pigs might fly". I pointed out it was a low milage and in very good condition, and asked him to show me another sub 100k manual turbo anywhere in the UK for less. Of course he couldn't, but responded calling me a "Unscrupulous scumbag". A quick scan through his feedback revealed he'd been involved in a dispute earlier that year in which he'd sold an elderly disabled gentleman a faulty wheel chair and refused to accept it back until eBay eventually had to step in.  I pointed this out to him and said that him calling me a scumbag might be a bit rich.... The messages stopped immediately... (I wish I'd had the presence of mind to screen capture the exchange!)

That was the last car I sold, and TBH given it was such a pain I'm deeply reluctant to get involved in the process again. 

I can resonate with this. In my experience there is a far worse class of buyer than the typical "best price cash 2day m8" types, and that is the forum-reading enthusiast who hasn't two pennies to rub together. 

A few years ago I was selling a lovely little 94 Fiat Tipo, a 1 owner example with small miles and NCT (MOT) that I picked up cheap from an old fella local to me. I had it on advertised with nice pictures, a nicely written ad etc. I got a few calls, but particularly remember one  from some middle-aged chap who, after a bit of rambling, proudly announces that he has a Brava and a Seicento or something like that....so he "knows the marque"

A few things stand out in my mind from that phone call:

-he wasn't happy that the (main dealer) service history was from a garage that had closed because he wouldn't be able to verify it with them.

-he wasn't happy that the tyres weren't a premium brand, and wondered what else the owner might have "skimped" on.

-he wasn't happy that the bonnet was resprayed (rookie mistake, I shouldn't have told him this) because it took away from the originality of the car....a 94 Tipo advertised for €500

etc...

By the end of the call he said he'd go and ask her indoors' permission to buy another car, and he'd get back to me with an offer if she said yes. I promptly blocked the number.

I've dealt with loads of similar types over the years and I can't stand them. Absolute muppets.

 

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22 minutes ago, The Vicar said:

-he wasn't happy that the tyres weren't a premium brand, and wondered what else the owner might have "skimped" on.

To be fair, tyres are always the first thing I look at when looking at a car. But I usually just walk away from it rather than be a knob to the seller about it. 

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23 minutes ago, sgtberbatov said:

To be fair, tyres are always the first thing I look at when looking at a car. But I usually just walk away from it rather than be a knob to the seller about it. 

They were Nankang in this case, and brand new too. To be fair, they aren’t the greatest option out there, but you could have far worse on a 500 quid motor!

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1 minute ago, The Vicar said:

They were Nankang in this case, and brand new too. To be fair, they aren’t the greatest option out there, but you could have far worse on a 500 quid motor!

That's not too bad.

It's when you've got Sailun on the front left, Landsail on the front right, and 20 year old Imperials on the rear is when it becomes a problem!

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On the other side of the coin I had to go through a selection process to buy my R26 Megane. I went to see it in the freezing, pissing rain and offered a little under asking price as it had colossal miles, was a little scruffy and had some obvious issues.

Rather than come back and say "I really want £x" He said "I've other people to see I'll let you know". I think this went on for 2 weeks and I even offered a little more for the car but he still wanted to see more people.

Eventually I got the call saying I had it. When I went to get it he said that I'd been selected as I said I was going to use it as a 2nd car and keep it in a garage rather than just rag it into the ground.

Very strange. 

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It was hard work.  I was getting ready to tell him to shove it when I received the call saying I was the chosen one.

Normally I cool off on cars when this kind of thing happens but I really wanted the Megane, which made it worse for me and better for him.

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On 2/9/2021 at 9:03 PM, sierraman said:

Sometimes I think people actually just want to wind me up by going ‘is this still for sale?’ They don’t actually want it, they just want to know if I’m still stuck with it. 

This reminds me of the days prior to internet when cars were often sold via small ads in the local newspaper. after a couple of weeks, someone would phone and pop the question - ‘is this still for sale?’ The person asking would be some irritating time wasting wanker trying to sell advertising space in another local paper, or Exchange & Mart, or Autotrader.

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@DodgyBastard did you get that clueless fucking simpleton from down the south of England after your Lada? I can't remember his name, but he seemed to be pestering anybody selling one with his amazing* knowledge of the values etc. Absolute turnip who basically had a budget of about 15p and wanted delivery, the moon on a stick and diamond encrusted unicorn. 

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[mention=5696]DodgyBastard[/mention] did you get that clueless fucking simpleton from down the south of England after your Lada? I can't remember his name, but he seemed to be pestering anybody selling one with his amazing* knowledge of the values etc. Absolute turnip who basically had a budget of about 15p and wanted delivery, the moon on a stick and diamond encrusted unicorn. 
This one!



Sent from my moto g(8) power using Tapatalk

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2 hours ago, bogeyhead said:

This reminds me of the days prior to internet when cars were often sold via small ads in the local newspaper. after a couple of weeks, someone would phone and pop the question - ‘is this still for sale?’ The person asking would be some irritating time wasting wanker trying to sell advertising space in another local paper, or Exchange & Mart, or Autotrader.

Nowadays they are chancers hoping your car didn't sell so they can make a stupid offer for it. Had more than one about the Sierra after it ended on eBay. The best thing to do is just completely ignore them.

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2 hours ago, bogeyhead said:

This reminds me of the days prior to internet when cars were often sold via small ads in the local newspaper. after a couple of weeks, someone would phone and pop the question - ‘is this still for sale?’ The person asking would be some irritating time wasting wanker trying to sell advertising space in another local paper, or Exchange & Mart, or Autotrader.

I remember buying a metro turbo in 1991, where my budget was £2k for a decent one.  Saw one at £2600, and knew my haggling was not that good so ignored it.  3 weeks later, I had been to look at a few dogs and started going back through the old autotraders and decided I'd see if he'd managed to sell it.

Ended up paying £1800, which was about its value, keeping it a year and selling it for £1750. 

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7 hours ago, captain_70s said:

I like the way the art of haggling has bottomed out at simply asking "wuts ur last price" straight out of the gate. Dribblers.

Also, what even the fuck is a "last price"?

I don't know where it started but the last price thing must have come from Germany where you are guaranteed to get 90% of buyer interest messages containing this question with at least 3 spelling and grammar errors per word. The good news is that you instantly have a sympathy bonus with a seller there if you know how to form a sentence and won't come across like a dick within the first 2 minutes of the conversation.

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