There is this WI guy who posted a question in ebay’s trust and safety dept on a car sale he made.
1. he buys car off ebay from guy in MN; guy tells him car had 199900 miles; it has 226000. THe MN Guy wont do anything so the guy:
2. Posts it to sell on ebay and someone from MN (not same one) buys it and now is having problems with car. Doesnt bother to register the car before he sold it to this guy either; no bill of sale (told WI doesnt require one); sells it for cash
3. Now this 2nd guy from MN is complaining he is having problems with the car; he is a policeman; etc etc.
We dont live in MN but this makes no sense to us so can someone explain to us the following:
1. Can someone in WI just sell a car they just bought and didnt register ; without registering the car and we presume that means putting the title in their name which gives them the right to sell the car?
2. No bill of sale and yet the car is driven to MN but without any problems??? ie being stopped as car has no plates on it.
This doesnt sound too kosher to us or even too legal since dont the state and the county want their tax money when you buy something so wouldnt he at least have to pay taxes on the purchase; and doesnt he need the car in his name before the car can be sold??? Can people just sell cars in WI like they sell other merchandise???
The whole thing sounds BOGUS to me, but if you are not one of the parties involved, why worry about it?
Who would buy a car with 226K miles and expect to have NO problems? Or even 199.9K miles
Stop wasting your time. Move on to something else.
-
If nothing has changed in the last 8 years or so, the answer is yes. There are places on the title for a second party assignment.
-
They used to only require a License Applied For sign on the car and that was supposed to be good for 30 days. People drove around with them permanently so they changed the law. You need a temporary plate now. It doesn’t surprise me one bit that they made the trip without getting pulled over.
Yes, you are SUPPOSED to pay taxes on the purchase. They are collected when you register.
I bought half a dozen cars with cash. I know one guy who made an impulse buy and bought a car on the side of the road with a third party check! That was back in the 80s however.
Is it legal? NO.
Is it done? Yes, all the time.
It’s called skipping a title or selling a car on an ‘open title’.
WI guy bought the car for resale from the former owner. (FO) WI guy knew it, FO didn’t. FO didn’t bother to write WI guy’s name on the reassignment line of the title because WI guy told him that he wasn’t sure whether he was going to register the car in his own name or that of his wife, son, pet dog or whomever. WI guy knew it wasn’t true, but FO went along with the ruse. ONLY the owner on the front of the title can assign it to the FIRST buyer on the back. WI guy is not a registered WI dealer, so he is not allowed to REASSIGN the title. Only a dealer can do that in any state I’ve ever heard of, and I’ve handled titles from LOTS of states.
So MN guy bought the car for cash. He has no recourse against FO because he bought it from WI guy. WI guy is out of state, so it is very difficult and costly for MN guy to sue him. Probably won’t happen. Most ebay auto sales are done “without warranty, expressed or implied”. By the time he took possession of the car, MN guy know it had over 200K miles. Just because he’s a cop, doesn’t lend any credence to his case. All he can do is post negative feedback with as many details as 80 characters will allow.
When you buy a “car” with 226,000 miles on it, you are buying scrap metal and should NEVER pay more than salvage value for the vehicle.
PT Barnum once said: “There’s a sucker born every minute”. This thread proves it once again.