I recently listed my ’61 Morris Minor for sale on our club website with an asking price of $14,100.00. After a couple of days, I was pleased to receive an e-mail from someone offering full asking price. He suggested he would overnight me a cashier’s check for $3,100.00 over the asking price to cover the cost of shipping the car to Florida. He suggested that his “agent” would come by our house and pick up the $3,100.00 in cash and arrange for the transportation.

A tempting offer, right? It would be easy to accept this offer, especially when I received the cashier’s check shown below. I did not, as I realized it was a scam that works as follows:

You deposit the check and then give the agent the $3,100.00. The buyer then puts a stop payment on the check and you are out the $3,100.00.

I determined this to be a scam because there were too many red flags, namely:

• 1.    It is rare to receive a full price offer with no negotiation.
• 2.    It is rare to have an “agent” come by to pick up cash.
• 3.    The cost to ship a car from Texas to Florida is less than $1,000.00.
• 4.    The cashier’s check issuer was not the seller.
• 5.    The check was not sent from the seller’s home address.
• 6.    The seller refused to provide his telephone number.
• 7.    The seller did not provide his address to allow me to send the title and bill of sale.

I offer this article to hopefully make people aware of the types of scams that are out there and suggest if you are not customarily selling cars, seek advice from club members that are so you are not left disappointed.

Safety fast!

- Contributed by Mike Woodward