Sold a Yamaha Waverunner - new owner wants to return it.....

Long story short, my father in law "gave us" a non working 2002 Yamaha Waverunner. I want nothing to do with anything like that because to my knowledge they've always been problematic and I'm more of a boat guy. Instead I offered to fix it and sell it for him. What started as a gauge cluster and battery replacement turned into $1800 in repairs but finally we had a ski that was good to go. The dealer test drove it for an hour and I rode it for another 30 minutes with no issues.

Saturday I list the thing for sale under retail because I just want to get it out of my garage. I get a lot of interest in it and finally at 6:30 this guy texts me showing interest, wanting to come that night. I said fine but obviously we can't sea trial it at night. Turns out he lives 2 hours away and finally shows up at 10:30. We start it in the drive way, run it on the hose and everything is good to go. He likes it and decides to buy it.I write up a bill of sale, give him the titles and I gladly reclaim my garage space.

Fast forward to 10:00 last night. I get a text saying the ski didn't run well and the gauge cluster stopped working. I said let's talk tomorrow and figure this out. I proceed to not sleep because these kinds of situations really freak me out. I'm a stand up guy and want to make sure everyone walks away satisfied.

I called him today during lunch.The issues he described do sound similar to the issues the dealer supposedly fixed. After talking it over I suggested we talk again this evening when he's by the waverunner and can actually look at a couple things.If it's the same issue as before then I can just bring it back to the shop and hopefully get this taken care of.....if the new owner wasn't two hours away.

30 minutes later and he said he discussed with his wife and wants to return the ski. I'm all about working with the guy but this seems a little extreme. For all I know this could be anything from the electrical gremlins reappearing to this guy has extremely bad luck and something else broke to he did something while riding the ski and now wants to get rid of it.

What do you think? What would you do? This whole situation is making me extremely anxious and I want to get it over with as soon as possible.

It is a 14 year old Waverunner. Buyer beware--I'd give the guy all the info for the dealership that you had it fixed at, and then back out of anything. Don't take it back, don't offer to help anymore.

Even though it's already codified as such in my state, I like to write AS IS in huge letters on the title. You did nothing wrong, send him to the dealer and ignore from then on.

mtn wrote: It is a 14 year old Waverunner. Buyer beware--I'd give the guy all the info for the dealership that you had it fixed at, and then back out of anything. Don't take it back, don't offer to help anymore.

This is the reality of the situation. It's legally an "as-is" sale, so no legal obligation on your part.
I also understand that you want to be a stand-up seller. I think offering to be the middle man between the new owner and the dealer that was supposed to have done the repairs is plenty.

I think that Caveat Emptor rules on this. He tested it, was satisfied, it is now his. Not to be a jerk, but you were the stand up guy, but not trying to take advantage of him. If you sold a 14yo BMW, same story. It's his.

I agree with you 100%, I'm just hoping this doesn't turn out ugly. Normally I have 2 of the state approve BOS ready to go to be signed by both parties. Since it was late and this thing sold way faster than I expected I ended up just handwriting a copy. I did put that it was as-is and where is on the BOS...unfortunately I don't have a copy of that.

Hell no, do NOT give him back this money. Who the hell buys a boat without a sea trial? Apparently the same kind of person who buys one without his wife's permission...which is the real issue here. I'd wager the ski is fine, it is the wife that has a blown fuse.

Enyar wrote: I agree with you 100%, I'm just hoping this doesn't turn out ugly. Normally I have 2 of the state approve BOS ready to go to be signed by both parties. Since it was late and this thing sold way faster than I expected I ended up just handwriting a copy. I did put that it was as-is and where is on the BOS...unfortunately I don't have a copy of that.

Wait...you don't have a copy of the BOS? Who does? Just the buyer? Not good.

You've got cash as your receipt and he has a BOS.
Tough situation but he owns it now.

You're a private seller, not a dealership. You've fulfilled your part of the bargain.

slefain wrote:

Enyar wrote: I agree with you 100%, I'm just hoping this doesn't turn out ugly. Normally I have 2 of the state approve BOS ready to go to be signed by both parties. Since it was late and this thing sold way faster than I expected I ended up just handwriting a copy. I did put that it was as-is and where is on the BOS...unfortunately I don't have a copy of that.

Wait...you don't have a copy of the BOS? Who does? Just the buyer? Not good.

Yep, all I have is cash. I didn't even remember to tear off the top part of the title. It's still sitting in my wallet actually, I'm going to deposit it this evening.

Yep, he bought a 14 year old toy. It ended up having problems. You can try to help him diagnose the problems and even send him to the dealer that fixed it last time.

But No on the returns.

Enyar wrote:

slefain wrote:

Enyar wrote: I agree with you 100%, I'm just hoping this doesn't turn out ugly. Normally I have 2 of the state approve BOS ready to go to be signed by both parties. Since it was late and this thing sold way faster than I expected I ended up just handwriting a copy. I did put that it was as-is and where is on the BOS...unfortunately I don't have a copy of that.

Wait...you don't have a copy of the BOS? Who does? Just the buyer? Not good.

Yep, all I have is cash. I didn't even remember to tear off the top part of the title. It's still sitting in my wallet actually, I'm going to deposit it this evening.

If you've got cash, you have nothing to worry about. What is he going to do, give you the thing back and demand you give him the money back? What money? Not his anymore.

And I know it sounds like I'm being an ass, but you're not a dealership, you didn't promise anything, you showed that it ran. He's complaining it is doing things that pretty much all older waverunners do. Actually it really sounds like his wife is mad that he bought it.

the dude might just want you to say you wont take it back so he can show his wife he 'tried'.

This is why I'm only shopping new PWCs.

In my book you have no obligations to the guy at this point. If you are going to lose sleep over it and feel like you were not a standup seller, then let him return it, get it fixed and sell it again. You would only be doing that for you- not for him. Sounds like he rolled the dice and lost. It's not your fault that he chose to play the game in the first place.

Thanks folks, I'm working with him on getting it fixed but told him I can't take the ski back.

Enyar wrote: Thanks folks, I'm working with him on getting it fixed but told him I can't take the ski back.

What are you charging per hour for your services? Seriously.

slefain wrote: Hell no, do NOT give him back this money. Who the hell buys a boat without a sea trial? Apparently the same kind of person who buys one without his wife's permission...which is the real issue here. I'd wager the ski is fine, it is the wife that has a blown fuse.

^^^^^^^ I'm with this guy. Don't come look at something late at night and then buy without a test drive.

Tell him "sorry, wife says no refunds"

Well this Monday is turning out to be one for the ages.

A new update:

The guy that bought it seems reasonable. We were working on figuring something out to fix that. The wife...not so much. Now we're having title issues. Apparently they tried to register the ski and were unable to. She says the DMV is claiming the signatures are fraudulent. The title was left mostly blank other than the sellers name was signed by the correct owner. The bill of sale was filled out on behalf of the owner by my wife (owners daughter). I've offered to overnight them a new bill of sale sent from the owner but they are for some reason not interested. As for the trailer the title was signed over by the previous owner. I never used the trailer and never put it in my/my FILs name because it was used solely to get the waverunner off my FILs boat lift and into my garage so we could sell it. So I may be partially at fault there but again this lady won't let me work with her. If I knew the persons name I could probably track them down via email or facebook if she really needs a new BOS. The wife is saying shes in contact with law enforcement who also say the signatures are fraudulent. At this point I'm convinced they realized they have buyers remorse and are trying any and everything to get out of the sale. I'm just not sure what I should be doing on my end.

This is a great reminder to not sell things at 11pm at night and to really cross my Ts and dot my Is.

Wait, your FIL didn't legally own the ski when he gave it to you? Nor does he have proof that he bought it?

PHeller wrote: Wait, your FIL didn't legally own the ski when he gave it to you? Nor does he have proof that he bought it?

For the ski we are good to go. He is the legal and original owner, we have a title that he signed as seller (name is on title). The bill of sale was filled out by his daughter but we are trying to mail a new bill of sale filled out/signed by him.

For the trailer it's still in the name of the original owner. We have a title that was signed by the original owner as seller (their name is on the title as well) but that person is not me or my FIL. It was my mistake for not putting it in one of our names but I just needed something to get the boat off the lift and into my garage until we could fix the ski. We used another trailer to get the ski around town when we brought it to the dealer.

Now the husband says he is letting his wife handle this because he's too stressed over the whole situation. She's being rather difficult to work with....

And for the record, he never gave it to me. It was never in my name and I just helped him fix it so we could sell it. It's always been in his name and as of now it still is.

I've had buyers remorse and realized I've been berkeleyed before. Not one time did I ever try to shove my ill-advised purchase back down the seller's throat. It's called accountability. It's called being an adult.

The buyers need to keep their used watercraft and trailer while using your generous help to get all the titling issues sorted. Buying ANYTHING from you would be a treat compared to many of the turds I've dealt with in the past.

I wish I could talk some sort of logic into this person. I bet I can even find the original owner of the trailer if she would tell me his name. I've been searching my emails but I haven't found it yet. He's local, super nice guy and I'm sure he would be willing to sign another bill of sale. She won't tell me his name or let me do anything. She just keeps saying LEOs are saying this and that and everyone agrees the signatures are fraudulent. I told he to tell the LEOs to call me directly and she says oh they will once I press charges.

This whole situation has been huge in turning off my addiction to Craigslist. What I really hate is these people know where I live and who knows what they are capable of. In the future I will be fully filling out all BOS and titles, meeting in a public place and I don't care what kind of sales tax you're trying to get out of.....the full price is going on the title.

What a mess. Now I'm 4 hours behind on work here in the office and I'm going to have to put in a late night.