3 ms·

most people find the car on eBay, then go in person or pay someone else to try it out before buying.

• sokoloff 17y ago
  Exactly. I bought both my classic Mustangs on Ebay. In both cases, I got the online description and photos, asked the sellers for additional information before bidding. I probably went through some part of this process on over 2 dozen cars, and bid on 5-6 of them Then in each case, at the close of the auction I basically said "So long as the car basically meets the description as you laid out, you're getting paid, but before you get paid, I'm verifying the basics." In one case I flew down to get it and paid actual cash. In the other case (much farther away), I had a car club buddy go check it out for basic conformance (title/VIN match, runs/drives, rust no worse than described, etc) at which point I wired the money, my buddy took the title, and I arranged the car transport pickup. One of my cars is as-good/better than was described all around. One of them had a moderate issue which I chalk up to "well, I still got a smoking deal on it, it's fixed now, and knowing everything, I'd still have done the deal, so..." If you know what you're doing, and want a (relatively) rare particular car, and don't have Barrett-Jackson type money, Ebay's a great place to buy cars.