Fraudulent Boat-for-sale Offer

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southshore fisherman
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Joined: Fri Feb 05, 2021 7:30 am
Location: North east Ohio

Fraudulent Boat-for-sale Offer

Postby southshore fisherman » Thu Feb 18, 2021 1:21 pm

You are all probably aware of this but it may save one person a big problem so that's why I'm posting.

I answered an ad on Craig's List for a 2014 170 Dauntless for $19,000. The boat was priced under what it should have been, so it looked like a good deal--but one that was not outrageous.

I wrote [to the seller] asking for more pictures. When I got the reply I was sure [the offer] was a scam. The seller said, "I'm selling because I don't need it, got in in the divorce." The seller said the boat was now "in the possession of eBay Motors and to go on eBay and use the Buy-It-Now button to buy the boat, delivery will be free."

The eBay page link looked very real but there were a few things that didn't seem right. I did a chat with eBay to confirm that [the page the fraudulent seller sent was not a link to the] real [eBay website].

I wanted to investigate further and clicked on the link that took me to what looked just like an eBay auction page with a few little differences. There was a line that said "private sale, cannot be seen in public search." I've never seen anything like that on eBay.

I like to check the seller's feedback. It was all as a buyer. When I clicked on feedback as seller the page would not change. When I clicked on the eBay logo at the top it did not take me to the eBay home page, instead it took me right back to page I was on.

The mistake I made was log into my eBay account from that page to try to investigate and it hit me that I should not have done that. I immediately changed that password and any others I use that were the same or similar.

I went to eBay though my short cut and engaged in a chat with them about the ad. They assured me it was a scam and hoped I had not sent money which I never came close to doing. eBay did give me an email address to forward a copy of that email to them which I will do now.

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Phil T
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Re: Fraudulent Boat-for-sale Offer

Postby Phil T » Thu Feb 18, 2021 2:14 pm

Don't even think of buying a boat you (or a trusted Whaler owner) can't inspect in person.
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jimh
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Re: Craig's list and eBay scam

Postby jimh » Thu Feb 18, 2021 2:21 pm

There have always been con men posing as sellers ready to exploit buyers who think they are exploiting the seller.