Learn me Private Sales! + Any good stories?

In reply to Datsun240ZGuy :

Many years ago, I lost out on a car I found on a Sunday due to banks being closed, I started keeping cash on hand so it wouldn't happen again, and it hasn't.

In reply to Evanuel9 :

Lots of good advice above.  I'll add some of my own:

• Start your search in the classifieds section of this very forum.
   
• If you're looking at specific cars, join a few forums for those cars and look in their classifieds.  Lots of times specific sellers or even specific cars are a known quantity in that community, and the regulars will vouch for them or point out problems.  This was true 10 years ago, anyway.  I don't know if forums are still a thing.  Perhaps FB groups have filled that niche.
   
• Look for even slightly mismatched paint, particularly at panel joints.  Look in the wheel wells, along the undersides of the rockers and under the bumpers for overspray paint.  All are signs of undisclosed or poorly performed repairs.
   
• "Just needs fuel pump" is code for "I don't want you to hear it run, if it even will."  Don't even bother to contact the seller.
   
• If they won't show you a physical title in their name with a matching VIN, walk.  If they won't text you a picture of that before you go to look at the car, think twice before you bother going.
   
• If anything seems fishy, it probably is.  Any mismatch between ID, names, VIN, mileage, description, condition, etc would be enough to make me walk.  No reason to take any chances.  Which leads me to...
   
• DO NOT get hung up on a specific car even if it seems exactly like what you want.  There are a million used cars out there.  If you can't come to terms, or there are any red flags, just keep looking.  You'll find one without those issues.

I've got good and bad private transaction stories:

• GOOD:  Bought a used 1995 Neon ACR in 1999 in a fly-and-drive about 12 hours away.  Seller was a known person in the GRM community.  Car was exactly as advertised though I had to make 2 flights because a sudden mechanical issue prevented me from driving it back the first time.  Seller fixed the issue and we closed the deal 2 weeks later at a reasonable price.
   
• BAD:  Went to look at a 2002 Outback Sport wagon for my daughter.  Car looked and drove decently but had way more miles on it than advertised.  Title was from a different state than the plates.  May even have had a different VIN?  Walked way based on the mileage discrepancy alone.
   
• GOOD:  Bought a 2002 Impreza wagon for my daughter.  It was a train-and-drive deal about 2 hours away.  CEL showing but I brought my cheap OBD-II reader, identified the issue, and knew I could fix it myself.  Used that info to negotiate a lower price.  Car was otherwise as advertised (maybe a little dirtier, inside and out), no evidence of body repair, and drove fine.  Bought it, cleaned it up, and she drove it for at least 5 years before selling it to a GRMer.
   
• BAD:  Looked at a 2008 or so Hyundai Sonata for my second daughter.  Car looked good in pictures and had a decent, low-miles history via Carfax.  Names and numbers matched.  Drove about 90 minutes to look at it and while it drove fine, the entire car had been resprayed with cheap 1-stage paint, which seller hadn't mentioned.  Walked away based on that.
   
• GOOD:  Bought a 2006 Impala for my second daughter.  Car was grampa-fresh and had been lovingly maintained.  Turned out it was being sold on behalf of grandma by an acquaintance so I trusted the history. She's still driving it 5 or 6 years later.

Good luck!  Keep us posted and ask us any questions.

I forgot that you had solicited stories!  My favorite was from my search for a cheap-but-not-trash motorhome.  I was shopping early 90's class A gassers with a budget of 9k, so there was a lot of crap out there.  I found one a few hundred miles away in Mississippi that looked nice.  Emailing back and forth, I asked my questions: Windshield cracked? Appliances all work? Water damage? Tire age? etc etc etc.  Everything sounded good.  So my dad and I packed up and headed down with a wad of cash.

Now, I very much hate the whole dumb southerner stereotype and don't believe that everyone - or even most people! - living south of the Mason-Dixon line are impoverished, uneducated, racists.  This family, however, absolutely lived up to every one of those stereotypes.  Despite what they told me, that coach had absolutely been used as a permanent residence.  The windshield was cracked from top to bottom.  There was some sort of latex paint on the headliner which was likely to cover up water stains. When I went to check the appliances, they said that they all worked, but they had removed the propane tank and most of the propane lines because -and I quote - "whud yew whon gas fer, an'wah?"  When I pointed out the windshield and that those would cost about a grand to replace, this lady started on a rant about how she knew that some people would never get pulled over for having a cracked windshield and it was apparently because of the amount of melanin present in their epidermis.  I didn't fully understand the connection, but I will say that she was quite versed in the various racial slurs and, despite having just met me about 15 minutes prior to this part of the conversation, was quite loquacious in her employment of them.  She then recommended that I engage in insurance fraud to pay for the replacement of the windshield and was quite taken aback when I expressed my general distaste for committing fraud.

I scratched my head a bit and tried to think about if there was any price at which I would have been willing to drive it home, but before I could come up with anything solid she screeched "wheeel, yew whon buy it er dawnt yah?"

Needless to say, I was definitely on the "dawnt yah" side of that equation.  Dad and I had a nice meal at a local restaurant, chugged down a beer, and beat feet back home.

In reply to bmw88rider :

Thanks!!

In reply to Caprigrip :

I've got my eye on quite a few different cars. My top choice right now is an e36s 3 series compact, but those tend to be difficult to find in any sort of reasonable condition. Also looking at various e36 and e46s three series, first generation and 2nd generation imprezas, bmw 1 series, fiat 500 abarths, lexus is300s, and recently looked at some mazda2, Honda fits, and fiesta St which would be my option is I can't find a reasonable one of the above. I linked a spreadsheet in the thread if you want to take a look

Part of my issues is that, having not driven most of these, I don't really know which one I want and, having not bought any cars before, what factors would be a dealbreakwr. And I'm hesitant to waste someone's time looking at a car only to say "sorry I want to look at some others first"

In reply to Danny Shields (Forum Supporter) :

Are miles a factor worth putting any stock in? My parents seem to care but from what I've read, miles can mean many different things depending on care and the owner

In reply to Ian F (Forum Supporter) :

In terms of cars, I've got a spreadsheet in the thread. Basically want as close to a 4 seat Miata as possible (parents said no 2 seaters). Older bimmers and imprezas mostly along with some lightweight econoboxes.  I'm in the Chicago area. In terms of risk - I'm willing to have some level of risk inherent in buying an interesting 90s car as opposed to a modern econobox or older Corolla, but I don't want to lose my savings which represent the majority of my net worth. 

In reply to calteg :

Thank you!! Is Carfax worth paying for?

In reply to John Welsh :

The 128i is definitely super interesting to me, and being a stick it's a bit of a unicorn. Though I am unsure because 3300 for a sport coupe is a lot. In terms if the accident, I interpreted the ad as saying they had had an accident in a separate car - not this one. I should probably clear that up. The seller did provide a vin for a Carfax though. 

My intention is a fun daily driver, but in a less practical sense of the word. I live in Chicago so I have a great public transport system, and my job is only a 15 minute walk away. When I got to college they have a very walkable campus with a great shuttle system so I'm not particularly worried about reliability as long as it doesn't bankrupt me or mean that I can never enjoy the car. And since I like working on cars I'm willing to accept more flaws than your average buyer. I also want to take it to autocross and track days so fun/fast in that arena is desirable but mostly I just want it to be good for learning and building those skills. My parents want me to aim for 90s and newer but will accept a really nice example of an 80s car. They have out the restriction of "no two seater sports cars" and no more than 1.5-2 hours away from me. So I'm basically looking for a 4 seat Miata equivalent.

I've got the money sitting in my bank account (5.5-6k budget), so I'm not worried about finding it but I'm moreso worried about buying the right car

In reply to Datsun240ZGuy :

Not a drawer but I do have it all in an account

In reply to Evanuel9 :

Last time I was searching private party used cars, I think I bought a month of Carfax, which was under $100 and gave you unlimited searches for 30 days.  Don't know if you can still do that.  If not, I would pay the $25 (or whatever) only on individual cars I was very interested in and was ready to pull the trigger on.

Carfax and the like are not infallible but are better than flying blind.

Miles are important but not the most important criteria.  Assuming similar overall condition (interior, paint, etc)  I would rather buy a well-maintained 100,000 mile car than a poorly maintained 60,000 mile car.

Same with years.  Unless there are big model changes, I would rather buy a well-documented car that is 3 or 4 years older than a newer one with an unknown or sketchy maintenance history.

My favorite story comes from when I was in L.A.  I had been looking for a big-fin cadillac for quite a while, so 59-62.  I kept a CL tab open with the search parameters and refreshed it once a day.  One night at about 10pm, a 62 SDV popped up.  Figuring the guy was still awake, I called.  $1500, doesn't run.  Fantastic steal even if it needed a new engine.  I drove from Pasadena to Torrance to look at it.  I noticed that the distributor cap was crooked.  I thought he may have just been diagnosing, or maybe I'm just that lucky.  I paid him at midnight and said I would go get my trailer.  He went back to bed and I went all the way to Van Nuys to get my buddy's trailer which caused his neighbors to call the cops.  I had to wake my buddy up to let them know it was OK and I wasn't stealing it.  Back down to Torrance at about 3am, I popped the distributor cap on, and it fired up instantly.  I was THAT lucky.   I drove it on the trailer, put some straps on it, and as I was driving away, the seller comes out in slippers and PJs with this look on his face like WTF.

Fast forward to a couple years later, my buddy and I drove that Caddy to Vegas and he said he wanted to buy it from me but he didn't have any money.  I bet him that if he could gamble what he had in his pocket and make $1500, I'd sell it to him for that much.  First stop was The Nugget.  He put what he had ($20 IIRC) on black 8 and it hit.  He pulled it back to ride on black and hit again.  He walked over to the cashier, collected his $1625, and put the cash in my hands.  I couldn't believe it.

Pic of the car for reference.

Evanuel9 said:

In reply to calteg :

Thank you!! Is Carfax worth paying for?

Short answer is "yes."  It gives you a sense of accident history, # of owners, where the car spent it's life, service history (or lack thereof), etc. For cars with analog odo's, it can also alert you to stuck or tampered odometers. I've very, very rarely seen any odometer rollbacks on cars with digital odos

calteg said:

Evanuel9 said:

In reply to calteg :

Thank you!! Is Carfax worth paying for?

Short answer is "yes."  It gives you a sense of accident history, # of owners, where the car spent it's life, service history (or lack thereof), etc. For cars with analog odo's, it can also alert you to stuck or tampered odometers. I've very, very rarely seen any odometer rollbacks on cars with digital odos

I agree, but there is a learning curve to reading behind the raw data.

For instance, you might see entries like:

12/2019  Regular maintenance   112,300 mi
04/2020  Emissions compliance   11,786 mi WARNING possible rollback detected
08/2020  Regular maintenance   120,877 mi

If that's the case, you can pretty much guarantee that the data entry person for the April update just missed a digit at the end and it should have been 117,86x.

You also may see an entry that says "Accident reported."  That means it had an accident.  If it's followed by "Total Loss," it is a salvage/rebuilt title.  If it says "John's Body Shop repaired it," then you know it was anything from a scratch in the door up to 75% destroyed.  If you always assume the worst, you'll always be safe, but you'll be passing on a lot of cars.  Here is the flip side to that coin.  If there are zero accidents reported, that doesn't mean it hasn't ever been in an accident, it just means that the accident never had an insurance claim.  Maybe it didn't have collision coverage, or maybe they drove it drunk and wrapped it around a tree and didn't want to get in trouble so they fixed it themselves with rivets and super glue.

Remember, it's a guide, not a reference.

Also, be sure you know that reporting things to Carfax is 100% voluntary, so all of the entries you see represent only a tiny fraction of its actual history

Curtis73 (Forum Supporter) said:

There is a Jaguar that I really want about an hour away.  He's asking more than twice what it's worth at $12,500.  I called and offered $6000.  He got insulted.  That was in (no joke) 2020, and that Jag is STILL on FBM.  Almost 4 years.  Good luck selling that Jag, buddy.

People are weird that way.  About 2 years ago, I chatted with a guy selling a Ducati 848 track bike.  $7k ask, which was highish for a track bike but not totally unreasonable in early '22, especially because he still had stock parts.  Come late '23, he still had it and put it up for auction on Iconicmotorbikeauctions.  High bid: $4700.  Market established, I got back in touch with him (I'm local) and offered $5500 as get-right-to-it price.  Not even a little interested at a dollar less than $7000. ("I have $2k in the triple tree and clutch alone!" ).  For $8500 I can buy a different  848 that has $30k in it...  

So it will sit.  Forever.  I guess he likes to look at it.  *shrug*.  Glad I didn't buy it - I'm using the money to prep another one of my bikes instead.

In reply to mfennell :

The odd thing I can't put together is that it's listed as a dealer, but it's a private sale.  At first I thought some dummy took in a salvage title at the dealer and they were selling it on the sly, but he claims it's clean title.  Super low miles, spotless car.  I would assume they would want that thing in the showroom.  KBB puts it at about $5k PPV, and $7k dealer retail.

Here is the link:

Recent-er ad asking 12 cash:  JAG

Original ad that I found in 2020.  This one advertises $6000 down, finance $9000.

In reply to Curtis73 (Forum Supporter) :

Correct. Carfax updated a few years ago and now includes a severity scale most of the time (minor/"regular" accident/severe damage). Rarely they will append a police case # to the accident as well. 

Story time:

Was selling a low mileage Boxster S. Two extremely brawny men drive up in a Kodiak Topkick. They wedge themselves in, take it for a test drive, try to haggle me down and we end up doing the deal. As they're pulling out of my driveway, one of them rolls the window down and asks "Is there anything I should know about this car before I leave?"  He was doing his best Tony Soprano impersonation, and the sight of 500lbs of dude in a Boxster S trying to be tough guys was just surreal. That was the first and last time I ever messed with a Porsche, the fan base is just too much.

Selling a Sprinter long long time ago. Guy contacts me out of the blue, asks a few cursory questions and offers to send me a bank draft from several states away. Super scammy, but I agree, on the condition that I'm going to sit on the car for a month after I deposit the check. To my surprise, the guy agrees. A month goes by, I have the car, the title, the keys, and his money. Transaction went smoothly but the takeaway is: don't be that trusting. Had I been less scrupulous it could have gone very badly for that buyer.

In reply to calteg :

I did a similar thing recently in the other direction, but not with a car.  Turned out fine, but I could have been easily taken advantage of.  I bought a powder coating setup from a random guy in Jersey off of FBM.  I Venmo'd money to someone I didn't know two states away.  The good new is that the gun showed up three days later in exactly the condition he described, but he could have taken my money and blocked me.

The only real horror story I have from a private party as the buyer was when I bought a C4 Corvette from a sketchy dude who was out to flip it and never had it titled in his name. He instead gave me a title signed by the previous owner. Unfortunately, the car had two names on the title but only one signature... and they no longer lived at the address on the paperwork. Took me about a month to track them down and get the title properly signed, although once I found the previous owners they were pretty understanding. Moral: Beware of flippers and of titles with multiple names. At least under Georgia law, every owner needs to sign the title to validate the sale, not just one.

I also have one seller-side story that I don't exactly feel good about: I sold a sport bike to a a buyer who probably wasn't old enough to buy beer. That transaction went fine. About a month later I got a call from the cops, late at night: They had found the bike on the side of the road. They didn't say anything about the condition, but I don't think it was rubber side down. And the kid had never titled it in his own name. I had kept a copy of the bill of sale with the buyer's name and address so I could give it to the cops. When you sell a vehicle, always keep a copy of the bill of sale in case the buyer doesn't bother registering it to make sure you're not liable for anything the buyer does. I still wonder if the kid survived and in what condition.

It is highly likely that you will encounter Rebuilt Title cars.  You might find a thread like this one helpful where the general consensus is to avoid unless you can get verifiable facts and still then likely avoid. 

I say at your price range stay away from cl and fb and like mentioned before, buy from here or an enthusiast forum group.   Will save you so much headache.  

In reply to John Welsh :

Well that's not promising lol, a lot of the cars that I can find at the price points have a rebuilt titles. Is there any way to assess it or just avoid because it's my first time and I'm inexperienced? (Will read the thread when not at work)

In reply to Caprigrip :

Thanks! I have looked through some forums, specifically one for a 318ti but they tend not to have much selection. I browse this forums classified but lately I haven't seen anything in my price range that meets my parents requirements and is interesting to me. I do still check every day though! 

In reply to MadScientistMatt :

Damn, that sounds like a pain in the ass. Glad the previous owner was understanding. 

That second story is just rough. Hope he was ok. 

In reply to Curtis73 (Forum Supporter) :

Thank you!! This is really helpful! If I find a car that seems right and I actually want to pull the trigger if it checks out, then I will buy a carfax.