Dodged a bullet, but someone else took it

ronholm wrote: I sold a Ford Explorer last year.. I had just had the engine out and reworked the timing chains... It was a very nice SUV and sold quickly.. Ran great.. I drove it around for a couple weeks and all was well.. I sold it and the guy calls me a day later telling me the engine started rattling and locked up. So I started mulling over what I could have possibly forgotten.. I eventually ended up meeting up with him to look it over. A breaker on the crank and sure enough it would turn one way a little bit and not the other at all.. Then I heard a sound from the back of the engine.. Some idiot(namely me) forgot to torque down the Torque Converter bolts. Sure enough the phone had rang about something far more important while working on the damned thing and I hadn't tightened them all the way up. Came back to the job a couple days later and totally forgot. He said he had a friend who would help him pull the engine and fix it.. I offered up a nice refund..

you're a good man.

I sold an XKR to a fella on the West Coast. While his daughter was driving it to him, she called him complaining that the Nav system didn't work. He, of course, called me. I had to explain to them both that it was one of the first gen nav systems, and didn't have touch screen.

DrBoost wrote: I had a guy call me a year after he bought my first Jeep. He blew the engine. Said he was going to sue me. I said I looked forward to seeing him in court. Then, a few years ago I sold a used R/V. The guy said a caliper over heated. It had been a few months since he bought it, but I did some brake work a few weeks before I sold it. I offered to drive the 4 hours to where the R/V was and do the work if he'd buy the parts. He said ok. Then he called me back and said that if I was really willing to drive 4 hours each way to work on the R/V, I must be honest. If I'm that honest he believed that I had no idea there were hidden issues (......on a 30 year-old R/V!!!) and that I shouldn't worry about it. To the OP. I might be inclined to give him a few hundred bucks, but that's just because I'm too nice. You don't owe him anything.

And this, kids, is how the world can be if you make it so.

When I totaled my B5 S4 avant I parted it out. Guy on the forums asked me about the clutch. I hadn't listed it as I didn't think anyone would want a used clutch, as its a big job to replace on those cars and to put in a used one is just stupid.

But, ok, yeah, I have a clutch, it worked fine in my car and was fine when it was removed. Sold it to him for peanuts. 6 (SIX!!) months later he emails me telling me the clutch is slipping and wants a refund. I tell him, sorry, you bought a used wear item and 6 months later you want a refund?!

Happened when I had my Viper. It was a '99 GTS. I sold it to a guy in Florida, I lived in PA at the time. I was fully up front about the car in my ad (though it didn't need anything anyway) when I sold it. About 3 or 4 weeks later, he called saying the CEL came on and he was also having some issues with the cooling system when running the a/c. This was absolutely news to me, I had never had any CELs when I owned the car and never had a problem with cooling or a/c.

I told him I felt bad, but there was nothing I could do about it. He kept pestering me for a while until I told him that no matter how much he pestered, I wasn't going to do anything and he had no legal recourse. He went away. I wasn't trying to be an ass, but it's out of my control that something happened to the car (allegedly) after I sold it. I had no way to know.

I bought my V70R from a dealer about 90 minutes from home. Drove it back in a snowstorm. 2 miles from home, it started bucking terribly under acceleration. I had to limp home at just above idle.

Some sleuthing with the scanner showed that the MAF had packed it in. 10 years, 110,000 miles...and 90 minutes after I took possession. ;)

I had the opposite luck. Sold an M3 over the web, guy was driving down Thursday for a Friday pick up and drive home. My wife drove it on Thursday for the "one last time drive" and it broke the radiator plastic fitting. Had to scramble to buy one locally and replace it before he arrived. That was a bummer of a phone call - car on the hook coming home, and having to do the math to figure out that the new owner was enroute about 350 miles away.

Solda co worker my old9C1 as he didn't have a car at the time. Had it for 9 days and we think the sun gear set siezed at 65mph, literally exploding the 700R4. shrapnel and pieces everywhere. I sold it for $1800, I gave him $300 back so he could get a used TH350 to stuff in there and a used driveshaft.

The 4L60E is known to have a finite lifespan, I'd feel bad for the guy, but not offering assistance bad. And that's giving the benefit of the doubt that no typical guy+RWD+LSx V8 shenanigans took place.

I sold a 1992 Escort wagon a while back and made great money on it. I bought it for $400 and cleaned, tuned and fixed the broken axle. Then I drove it hard (pizza delivery) for about 5 weeks and sold a solid tested car! 22 miles after leaving the house I get a call that something had gone clunk and it stopped running.

It had lost a wrist pin and sawed the engine in half!

Well I had 3 more engines laying around Kinda wanted to see how fast I could swap an engine and was NOT gonna give back his money. I suspected the daughter who drove off in the car might have been unhappy at dads choice of rides and just floored it in first gear for the ride home!

3 hours later I pull up at his work with a running car. Never heard from him again!

Sold a Ranger truck and got a call from a pissed new owner that it had crapped out. Ran bad, Tach went wild then just stopped. My experience told me it was the TFIC module so I grabbed one off a parts car and fixed it before lunch...she paid for lunch...worth it!

Another Ranger I sent out with a BIG warning. I had not yet run through all the little tests I like to do and told him he needed to get the radiator flushed and checked as I suspected a leak. This was in May and I told him to bring it back soon and I would do the work. September rolls around and he calls that steam was coming out from under the hood. Told him to bite me.

On the far end was a 1974 Mustang that started to smoke around 285,000 miles and I sold it to a fellow that promptly moved 250 miles away. This was in 1982 and as of 3 years ago it is still running.

Bruce

Here is a reverse one. My youngest brother knows everything. He had a VW Beetle. The thing ran like a top.
One day it stopped running. My other brother and I offered to take a look at it to see if we could help him get it going. Both this brother and me worked as mechanics at the time. Youngest brother wanted to be lead singer in a garage band - that is all he knew about garages. Anyway he messes with the VW for a few weeks, we keep offering to help, etc but cannot get it started. Finally he puts an ad in the paper to sell it. Some guy comes over, cranks it a few times (won't start), and says he will take it. Handed my brother $200, got the title signed, bill of sale. Then says "I'll be right back" his wingman driving the car they came in. He comes back 15 minutes later with a can of gasoline. He pours it into the tank. Cranks the VW a few times and Vroom! Starts it up and drives away, his wingman following. VW Beetle brother stood there completely dumbfounded while my other brother and I had the ultimate ROFL.

To OP: Not your fault. The other guy is either wired to accept it, or believe you dumped it on him. $500 isn't going to change his mind either way. Save your money and your conscience.

I bought a Chevy truck for cheap. 3 weeks later the trans took a E36 M3. Only had 1st and 2nd after it warmed up. I bought a rebuilt unit and installed it myself. At no point in time did I think about calling the previous owner to ask for a discount or refund. It was my truck now and my responsibility.

You dodged a bullet, he lost at gambling on a used vehicle.

I always give a buyer the opportunity to have a car vetted by whoever they want. If it is acceptable to them and they make a deal, that ends my responsibility to the buyer. Would I feel bad if the car craps out on their way home? Sure, but it wouldn't make me give any refund.

In the absence of any misrepresentation, the buyer did their due diligence and own the car without any representations, "as is, where is".

If I was on the other end of the stick, I'd feel bad for me, but I wouldn't go mooching around for a rebate.

I'm in the 'as is' = no obligation camp. No matter how nice a guy he seems you really don't know what happened after the sale, he or others could have hooned it for all ya know. Or simply, as they say E36 M3 happens.

If the OP really made out on the sale a small refund could help sleep at night, why not. Few hundred maybe if it don't break the bank.

Man, I'm surprised by all these stories of buyers expecting sellers to refund/fix/rectify a problem after the vehicle's sold. I've had my fair share of used items (cars, appliances, whatever) breaking or stop working shortly after buying them. I've always chocked that up to having bought a used thing from a classified ad/craigslist/eBay. Thought that was how the world worked. Huh.

About 6 years ago I bought a Honda Magna from a kid who had DUIed his way into pedestrian status. I test rode the bike and it was good. Got a ride to his place the next day from my brother and took possession of my shiny new ride. Life is good and the FSM is smiling upon me as I ride away feeling awesome!

For two blocks and the bike just dies. The feeling of dread about my glorious new purchase being busted and what it could possibly be, all the thrown away dollars swirling around in my head.

Quick check of the systems.....and flipped the fuel switch over to reserve . I'd run out of gas that close to the guys house. Rode straight to the nearest gas station on "reserve" and filled the tank.

Then rode home, never had another mechanical issue out of the bike. It was perfect.

Sold my 94 Z28 with 194k miles to a hillbilly neighbor of my girlfriend at the time in exchange for $1000 and an 86 Ford Ranger in running but rough shape.

Guy tried to tell me I ripped him off and it dropped a valve a week later.

Right... The ton of rubber in his driveway had nothing to do with it... Let alone the engine made no noises when sold, so it's not like I had any reason to believe a problem would arise.

I told him to pound sand and broke up with the girl anyway shortly after so all was good.

The truck left me stranded about 6 months later when the trans started slipping in traffic on 264 before the HRBT so I feel we're even.

I like selling stuff to Carmax if the price isn't too unreasonable, I hate dealing with people.

I got lucky with my 540i. Fly-and-drive Ohio back to Denver, wore through and blew 3 'good looking' tires on the drive home, the steering wheel would shake out of my hands any time I applied brakes at highway speed, and the right side of the seat back stayed down as I tried to raise it back up. He contacted me a week later to see how the drive went, and sent me $700 via paypal as soon as he read my email. That was classy, and I guess I got to see how pretty the stars are at 2am in BFE Nebraska

It was interesting when I bought my R/T. It took $1k of work to pass inspection and another $1k+ over the first year. About a year later the seller emailed me asking how the car was doing, as he had seen it around. I couldn't bring myself to to tell him how bad the car had been without sounding resentful, which I wasn't.

That said, the peak gas prices of '08 was a terrible time to be shopping for a small car on the private used market.

I think I posted about this sort of situation when I sold our BMW 330i. It had this weird noise it would make every so often when you first started it up. I forget what it was, but it was loud enough to be noticeable. Seemed like some sort of clutch issue because as soon as you clutched in and drove away it would go away and not happen again until the next time it was cold and you started it up, but even then it was intermittent. Talked to some other owners and they said it just seemed to do this and people drove it for 150k plus miles and never really had an issue. So, I just let it be since I didn't feel like tearing into the trans on the car. I forgot it did it, because I never drove the car as it was my wife's car.

At around 90k miles or so we decided to sell it. Kid came over to buy the car. Test drove it, car didn't make the noise at all. Paid up, drove home and the next day I get a call that it's making the noise. Like I said I had forgotten about it, but the kid was all upset so I told him what I knew that it wasn't gonna kill the car so just drive it. At that point I felt kinda bad, because I had not mentioned the noise and considered trying to help him out with some money to fix it, but at the same time the kid was talking about taking it to some shop and letting them just go at it without them really knowing what the noise was about and I decided I didn't want to get into exploratory surgery money on a BMW so I basically told him he was on his own.

I just recently bought a 2006 Corvette Z06 without a real PPI on it, because it was a good deal and the car had a bit of history that I could see where it seemed like it was in good shape. Get the car and the clutch is very unlike my friend's cars, very stiff and grabby. I think at first that it has an aftermarket. Seller has no clue what a Z06 clutch was supposed to feel like as he owned it only for a year. Get the clutch done on the car and the clutch was stock, but it was toast and it was so bad it damaged the driveshaft. I tend to believe the seller that he had no clue what it was supposed to be like, but it's not like I went running to him asking for money for the work to fix it.

I am an honest seller and I provide any information I can to potential purchasers, full disclosure. I make it clear that it is an "as-is, where-is" sale.

I also understand as a buyer that this is the case.

I prepare 2 copies of a Bill of Sale as either a seller or buyer that both parties sign.

Either way, when that vehicle leaves my driveway or I leave the buyers driveway, the purchaser is on their own.

Had a pile of Geo Metro goodness for sale on the street corner. Ended up with the 2 people in the world that A-wanted it and B-had the cash in front of me at the same time. Minor bidding war ensued and the first guy that showed offered $300 over asking-paid the cash and drove off. Was talking to the second buyer (I was going thru a TON of cars at the time; how about a Volvo wagon?) and the Metro did not even make it out of sight-timing belt broke. Was ready to hand him his cash back; but he was such a jerk about it; yelling and screaming that I was a con artist; knew it was going to break; blah blah blah. About the time it looked like it was going to get physical the other potential buyer signaled his 3 high school football playing sons to get out of the van he was driving; and he quickly changed his tune and walked back to his Geo.

Sold him that Volvo for a lot less than the Metro! (Was a WAY nicer car)

And the Geo guy ended up calling on another car I had; once he realized who I was (that number looks familiar!) we talked much more calmly and sold him some Honda/Toyota I had taking the Geo as a "trade".