Used Deals Thread

There’s no rule against flipping something on other sites, just can’t do it here. Besides, after PayPal fees and shipping and insurance he would have netted less than the price originally paid anyway.

Let’s move on. The whole misunderstanding here came from an erroneous assumption.

 

Does this eBay account smell fishy to you ?

https://www.ebay.com/usr/us2014_gesu

Many hi-fi items for sale and clearly photographed in different locations. I asked buy now prices for a couple of items and the prices are very good, maybe even a bit too good if you know what I mean. But with eBay money back guarantee & Paypal buyer's protection, wouldn't it still be pretty much risk free?

 

That is clearly a scam. The scammer takes over a dormant but real Ebay account with positive feedback. They pull pics and descriptions from real auctions and repost them with their own contact info. They wont respond to or honor any bids through ebay but instead urge you to email them directly for a 'better' price. If you contact them you've violated EBay's terms of service so Ebay isnt on the hook to help you, and the scammer wont take PP Business.

This type of listing appears all the time but since EBay doesnt have to pay out money to victims they just dont care. And usually the scammer at least takes over an account with more than 15 feedback, this is an exceptionally poor effort on their part.

 

Just them directing them to email them directly for a better price is a violation of Ebay's terms of service. Suggesting taking business off of eBay is a strict no-no and will not even allow the @ symbol in messages.

Ebay may charge high prices, but for that price is buyer and seller protections. Once you take the business off of eBay, you are on your own.

 

In this case I contacted the seller via email. Got a couple additional pictures of the item and asked more questions about the condition. They said they'd post a new ad with a 'buy now price' if I'd like to buy the item directly without having to wait the bidding to end. If I still purchase the product via eBay, wouldn't I still be protected by eBay's money back guarantee even if I've contacted the seller off channel?

 

The ad is a clear, known, regularly occurring scam. Multiple big ticket items, all posted at the same time, clearly differing text blocks, clearly differing images, and that stupid multi-color text. Scam, scam, scam. You cannot come out ahead on this even if you 'win' against ebay. Which you wont.

I don't want to sound like a jerk but you'll lose money here. I suggest you skip it.

 

Thanks for the advice! I will keep harassing the seller more with stupid questions just for the kicks.

 

ogodie is right, a month and a half back or so when I was hunting for a Dave I humored myself by following one of these down the rabbit hole. they did everything they could to sound human, but in the end when they finally sent the "buy it now" link they promised it was a scam link, didn't even go to real eBay. what a lame scam

 

I dealt with one of these situations when chasing a too good to be true price one time, and they actually had a very sophisticated fake/foreign eBay buy it now link that had you sign in and everything. Be careful out there folks. Luckily I bailed and changed my ebay password, but scary how close it felt to legit.

 

Somewhere on SBAF I posted the story of my dealings with this type of scam. I responded to one one time but it smelled too fishy so I started watching for them. The scammer had multiple hacked accounts & would post thousands of fake ads over night on Fridays. On Saturday mornings they'd have 3 or even 4 accounts running the exact same ads: One morning I counted over 17,000 fake ads in total. All you could do was flag some of the ads to Ebay and they'd shut down the account several hours later.

@SoupRKnowva , thats correct. Even if you 'buy' through Ebay the scammer will tell you to wait for an invoice, then the invoice directs you to a third-party site.

@Collusion, I used to add the e-mail addresses listed in the ads to spam-email bots. This floods the email address during the time the scammer wants to use it. They can shut down the mailbox of course but then they wouldn't get emails from their victims either.

 

The wild thing about that scammer is that they seem to have their finger on the pulse of the vintage market. I mean, who knows to have too good to be true prices on stuff like the SP10mk3 or Rockport turntables, etc.?

 

They note the price from the original ads and half them or so. The ads I see focus on high-price tech (audio, watches, cameras) and sports gear (skis, bikes, and pool cues of all things).

 

$25 Modi 3: https://www.head-fi.org/classifieds/schiit-modi-3.23122/

 

ECP Torpedo (3?) with an assortment of tubes for $835: https://www.usaudiomart.com/details/649844992-ecp-torpedo-headphone-amplifier-with-20-tubes/

About $100 more expensive than "deal" examples but this one seems to include 21 tubes that might be worth something.

 

Run-don't-walk Bifrost 2 ($425): Schiit Audio - Bifrost True Multibit DAC with Unison USB For Sale - US Audio Mart

 

Killer deal!

 

https://www.usaudiomart.com/details/649845621-schiit-yggdrasil-analog-2-with-unison/

Not a screaming deal or anything, but I figured there seems to always been someone looking for a Yggdrasil A2

 

Probably too late and this DAC gets little-to-no-love here, but Denafrips Ares 2 for $500 (net to seller): https://www.head-fi.org/classifieds/denafrips-ares-2.23371/ -- $100+ below-market

 

For those into vintage UltraAnalog DACs: Classé DAC-1 @ $749!

Used to own this own, it's one of the great ones technically with a very clear and linear sound (if slightly leaner than the other R2R DACs of the Golden Era)! Not sterile like modern chi-fi DACs, mind you!

 

Meier Soul for $1550 which I think is the cheapest I've ever seen it.
https://www.head-fi.org/classifieds/meier-corda-soul.21507/