| Author | Message | ||
     Jerseyguy |
I've been looking to pick up a used XB for my son in law on eBay the last few weeks and I've run into 3 bad auctions. One was killed by eBay (TKO) for some reason but the other two were more insidious. The way it works is the auction ends & you don't win. Then you get a "second chance" purchase supposedly through eBay because the auction winner was a deadbeat. Now you are told to email the seller with certain information and then the deal will go through eBay for your purchase. I played along on one and emailed several times and finally I said for him to send me his cell number to discuss shipping. He actually said he had a recent operation and couldn't hear. I'm not kidding. LOL. If you forward the emails to spoof@ebay.com eBay will quickly respond on the legitimacy of an auction or email. Caveat Emptor! | ||
| Mikej |
If I'm bidding on something and that happens I just tell them to re-list the item. There is a lot of schill bidding and other games on ebay. | ||
| Scitz |
When it comes to buying bikes I try to find something close enough to drive to pickup. Then I pay the full amount at pickup. Some sellers ask for a deposit but will work with you if you email them before the auction ends. | ||
| Josh_ |
That just happened to me (second chance offer) and I wound up with a killer price on a like-new item I really needed. I have yet to be screwed selling or buying online(tho I did go through hell on a Buell item from a seller-from-hell a while back) | ||
| Steve_mackay |
We've purchased 4 Buells and 1 DNEPR(Ural sidecar bike) off Ebay in the past 18 months. Only 1 bike was seen before the end of the auction. The rest were purchased sight un-seen. Never been screwed yet(knock on wood!). | ||
| Tpoppa |
Steve, What is your impression on the Ural? Build quality, performance, usefulness, fun factor, etc. I have seen them popping up on a few sport touring boards. | ||
| Steve_mackay |
Well, the DNEPR is made in a different factory than the actual URALs. It's quality, well... I think an AMF Harley has this thing beat  But that's expected. the kit for these bikes is $4-5K. This particular bike was built by someone else. And bought for $3K IIRC, for a 2003. I've only ridden it once(My brother bought it). Performance wise, it's adequate for it's intended purpose. And being only a 650CC bike, that's quite heavy. The URALS are 750CC. The brakes kinda suck, but what do you expect for mechanical drum brakes? The URALs have juice front and rear. Brembo front IIRC. The actual URALS have these thing beat hands down. But for a bunch more money. | ||
| Jerseyguy |
I got my first Buell off of eBay without a hitch. I called Buell customer service with the VIN to see if the guy was the registered owner which he was. $264 to ship from Miami to Jersey. I dunno why I'm getting a string of bad bike auctions at the moment. | ||
| Gentleman_jon |
I have bought two bikes on eBay, one for me, ( Buell Blast), and one for my buddy, ( Aprilia Mille). Both were bought from dealers who were selling them for less than they would accept in their showrooms. Both bikes were new, and the prices were excellent. However, buying used bikes that you can't inspect before bidding, and have to pay for before picking up, is something I would be very careful about doing. I would definitely want the vin number, to check if stolen, and I would want to talk with the seller: it is usually pretty easy to see if the guy is for real or not on the phone. Of course I want to see good feedback, and lots of it on related items. Anything less than 99% is a no go for me. I have seen quite a few scam auctions on eBay lately. One never -fail tip off is an auction where you need to " pre-qualify". Never saw one of those that was not a fake. Now that I think of it, eBay seems to finally have gotten rid of them, haven't seen any lately. | ||
| Mbohmann |
Lots of scams on Ebay, as well as good deals. Take their advice and be careful. I LMAO at a guy that offered a Buell XB12S for sale on a small website. The pics he sent me were from a bike I watched sell on Ebay a few weeks previous. He had hijacked the pics! I caught the scam real quick because I had been watching the market for a while. | ||
| Ocbueller |
What is the proper way to check a VIN # when buying a used bike? I was surprised that Buell gave out that info. Can you check with the DMV? SteveH | ||
| Joemama |
Also watch out for Buy It Now items with ask before you bid. Most of the time it's a scam. If the buy it now is low and the item is spectacular and there are no bids it is a scam. Trust me I have seen a few. | ||
| Outrider |
Ya gotta love the seller's sniper attacks. A friend was bidding on an item and the bidding got a little intense in the last few minutes. The bids were in a gradual sequence leading to the last second when a sniper popped a bid that doubled the highest bid. Make sense? I don't think so. Especially when the snipers bid was well over retail for the product at any store in the Milwaukee market. Looks more like the seller didn't want to let it go low and used a sniper to let him auction it again with hopefully better results. | ||
| Josh_ |
All kinds of crazy stuff happens at auctions. I attended a Hardware store out-of-business auction where stuff went for higher than the sticker price. (ie the price any hardware store would sell it for) I've "sniped" items before just because the item was ending right when I ran the search. I'm currently reselling an item I bought 2 weeks ago that it turned out I didn't need. It's currently (with 1 day left) bid up 150% more than I paid for it... Last year my dad picked up an '03 Sportster custom with 400miles and $2000 worth of chrome from a dealer for $5000... Mom decided his ebay habits were acceptable after that one. | ||
| Genesisclimber |
Don't bother with any of the Buell Carbon Fiber stuff on Ebay- I paid $60.00 for a chin fairing about a year ago and never got it. It's the same company (LLCarbon, Madsen Productions, 3A paintball, Dixo...etc) they just change their name and let the bad feedback rack up until ebay shuts em down... | ||
| Pcmodeler |
I'm with Scitz. I bought my Buell through ebay. However, it was a dealer. I drove to pick it up and he ended the auction early. |
