2.3: Buying Sight Unseen from a Dealer or Private Party

The reality of any substantial car collection is that, at some point, you will find the exact car you’ve been looking for … and it will be thousands of miles away. In this instance you have two choices: ignore the opportunity and pass on what might be a perfect car, or prepare to do a little more work and potentially appreciate the benefit of a global car market. While the former is obvious, and even if you pass on buying an out-of-market car you can still use the details to inform your purchase if you find a car locally, often times the additional work required to buy a car remotely can pay off handsomely. Since you will eventually find a car you’d like somewhere other than where you live let’s dig into the extra work you’ll need to do to be successful.

Dangerous or Very Dangerous

The reality of buying a car via a remote transaction is that you have the potential to dramatically increase the risk that you will end up with a car that is not substantially “as advertised.” And I don’t say this because I believe that remote sellers are inherently more deceptive than a local seller, not at all. Rather, the risk arises from the fact that, unless you’re willing to go see the car for yourself, there is a chance that some piece of information regarding the vehicle will not get mentioned and, if that creates a problem, it becomes your problem. Certainly there are ways to mitigate and minimize the risk that we will discuss in this chapter, but suffice to say I personally do not recommend buying sight unseen until you have a pretty good handle on buying collectable cars in your own backyard.

The biggest piece of advice I can give if you’re looking to purchase a car from out-of-market is to buy from a brand or highly reputable dealership. As I outlined earlier, dealerships have reputations to protect, and it’s every bit as easy to leave a dealership a bad review on Google, Yelp, and Autotrader as it is to badmouth them at your local Cars and Coffee. Especially with higher-end brands, the experience you’ll have buying a car sight unseen is very similar to the one you’ll have in person. Dealerships are much more likely to accurately represent the car, its service history, and the current state of things like paint, interior condition, tire wear, and so on. That’s not to say they won’t “forget” to mention issues that may be present — sales staff often know the cars they sell very well, and they know what to mention and what to leave out unless directly asked — which puts the onus on you to do your homework and know what questions to ask.

When I say “brand or highly reputable” dealership I am talking about a very specific list. A Mercedes dealership in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma is run more or less the same way a Mercedes dealership is in Boston, Massachusetts. Same for Ferrari and Porsche and BMW and so on; official brand dealerships are often run with guidance and oversight from the brand’s country group and global sales organization. Especially given the likelihood that failure on their local dealerships part will eventually become national news, the bigger brands are less likely to employ folks who will actively lie to complete a transaction.

My 2013 Mercedes AMG SLS bought sight unseen from a dealer in Oklahoma.

That said, “less likely” doesn’t mean it won’t happen — just ask the 30 people across the United States who were conned out of $3,000,000 USD deposits by Champion Porsche’s Vice President of Marketing Shiraaz Sookralli. According to court documents, Sookralli had taken in deposits for rare and hard to get Porsche that he then funneled into his personal bank accounts. Fundamentally Mr. Sookralli misrepresented his ability to procure rare Porsche for customers, taking deposits for cars that he didn’t actually have allocations, and kept the money for himself. And strangely enough, given how difficult it can be to buy Porsche’s GT cars even if you have plenty of money, I can see how potential buyers were taken in by Sookralli’s scam. I can also imagine how disappointed each of these few dozen “buyers” were when they found out that they had been taken for a ride and wouldn’t be getting that rare and powerful Porsche. Sookralli was eventually sentenced to six and a half years in prison; Champion Porsche never recovered the monies that he took in as part of the scam.

Messed up, huh?

Fortunately, and to my point about brand dealerships caring about the relationship they have with their customers, Champion Porsche reimbursed all of the buyers who were taken in by Sookralli and detailed how they too were victimized as part of the scam. While there is some debate online about how culpable Champion was in this situation, at the end of the day the company did what they could by reimbursing customers out of their own pocket and so, at least, potential buyers didn’t have to suffer both insult and financial injury.

But I digress.

Beyond buying from a brand dealership you should also consider “highly reputable” dealers that sell the type of cars you’re looking for. Here my guidance is less specific because the actual dealerships you’d consider is a function of the model of car you’re after. For example, if you were looking for an air-cooled Porsche, in addition to your local market I would advise you to consider Sloan Motors in New Haven, Connecticut, Road Scholars in Durham, North Carolina, and Marshall Goldman in Cleveland, Ohio. But if instead you wanted a low mile, water cooled Porsche GT car, again in addition to your local Porsche dealership, you might want to look at iLusso in Costa Mesa, California, or Merit Partners in Atlanta, Georgia. And if you want a Ferrari or a Lamborghini or a classic Mustang … there will be a different short-list of well known dealerships you should be reaching out to. This type of dealership, while not governed by a global organization, will often treat their customers with the same type of consideration that a brand dealership would. If they are known in the collector car community as being reputable, and if you’re easily able to find positive reviews about their cars and sales staff, you are probably fine — assuming you follow the rest of the advice I give in this chapter.

My 1972 Porsche 911 T “forward date” I bought sight unseen from Merit Partners in Atlanta.

And this isn’t to say that the hundreds of thousands of other, smaller, and less well known dealerships out there aren’t a good place to buy cars remotely; they certainly may be, but you start to introduce greater risk as you move into smaller dealerships. Here’s why:

1. Smaller dealerships are harder to research online. While a larger third-party dealership will show up in lots of Internet searches, be mentioned in your favorite online car communities, and have a presence in the broader collector car community, smaller dealerships are generally more anonymous outside of their region or city. It doesn’t mean they are shady or bad, not at all; just that it may be substantially harder to research their reputation and find the unbiased information you’d like to have before making a remote purchase. The information is there, but the bar you have to hurdle is higher;
2. If a rare car is at a small dealership you should be asking yourself “why?” The best cars usually end up with the best dealerships in my experience. And while there are certainly exceptions, if you find a car that seems perfect but it’s for sale at a dealership that you’ve never heard of and that doesn’t really seem to be right for the purported value of the car, you are wise to be suspicious. Yes, of course, the seller may have a relationship with the dealership or they may be giving them a break on consignment, but the car may have issues and has already been turned away from larger, more reputable sellers. If you’re willing to take the risk you can certainly do your homework and discover why the car is where it is, but it’s definitely extra work so be sure you really want that car.
   
   An exception to this guidance arises in small markets across the country. Sometimes you’ll find a car advertised in a town you’ve never heard of and that is nowhere near a major city. In those cases it’s worth digging into, at least a little bit, to see if the listing is just one of convenience and practicality for the seller. Car collectors live everywhere these days and so it’s not unimaginable to find an amazing example in an unobvious place from time to time;
3. Small dealerships come and go. Given that a lot of what mitigates the risk in remote buying is the selling dealership’s motivation to protect their reputation, if that motivation goes away your risk increases. It’s not to say that after a few bad transactions a small dealer will just close up shop, but certainly if you don’t have a lot invested in your brand it’s far easier to change your company’s name and thusly distance yourself somewhat from bad reviews and a dodgy reputation. And while if that happens to a local buyer they likely have the resources to find the dealership under their new name if need be, as a remote buyer it can be an awful lot of work and likely not worth your time.

If you cornered me and said “I found the perfect car at an unknown dealer what should I do?” I would be honest and tell you do really, really do your homework. Research the seller, research the car, follow the guidance I have given regarding buying from a local dealership and add to that the guidance I am about to provide below, and pay close attention to your intuition. If, at any point, you start to feel like something is wrong, thank the seller for their time and walk away from the transaction because, and trust me on this one, there will always be another car.

Okay, with that guidance in mind, I still need to tell you everything you need to know to mitigate your risk when buying any car via a remote transaction:

1. Be ready to walk away from any deal. When dealing with a distant seller you really need to be willing to let the car go at any point, otherwise you’re liable to make a decision you might not make if you were looking at the car in person. There are countless reasons you’d want to walk away from a car you can’t see: the seller could be giving vague answers, they may not be willing to facilitate a pre-purchase inspection, the price could change, your designated “eyes” could see something the seller did not disclose, and honestly, your instincts could just be telling you “this is not the car.” While you may miss out on an otherwise good car or deal if you walk away, most people don’t trust their instincts nearly often enough, and so if yours are saying “walk” you should listen to them.
   
   Honestly when I asked the people I trust the most about buying a collectable car from a remote seller they said “are you crazy” and trust me, these guys know how much I like buying cars! If you mentally prepare yourself to have the deal fall through you’ll be far less likely to make a poor decision and far more likely, if successful, to find the car you really want to own;
2. Be ready to lose the car to a more aggressive buyer. Another common problem with buying collectable cars that gets worse in remote purchase situations is the car just getting sold to someone else. Without a doubt if you’re looking at a car you found online, especially if it’s desirable, other people are looking too and in the world of collecting cars the rule is “money talks and baloney walks.”
   
   Don’t fall so in love with a car that you’re willing to make a bad decision if the seller says, “other folks are looking at this beauty, my friend.” Of course they are, that’s why you’re looking at it, but buying a car from a distance is a process and if you take shortcuts just because you’re worried it might get away can lead to expensive and frustrating consequences. I have lost cars to local buyers who were able to see the vehicle first-hand while I was working to set up a pre-purchase inspection and, while maddening, it was better to lose the car than to buy it without knowing what all I could be getting into;
3. Consider sending the seller a deposit that is refundable upon inspection. The way to prevent losing a car to a more aggressive buyer is to give the seller some type of deposit that shows that you’re very interested in the car. If the car looks good and if the conversation is going well you’re wise to ask the seller outright if you can send them a deposit that will allow them to hold the car while you arrange for a pre-purchase inspection, look into shipping costs, etc. The best deposit is one that is fully refundable contingent on inspection and the car being largely “as advertised” as spelled out in a written agreement. Consider something that says “deposit is fully refundable to buyer if car does not meet buyer’s expectations following a pre-purchase inspection conducted by [NAME OF SHOP] and a visual inspection conducted by buyer or buyer’s agent.” Ideally the deposit agreement doesn’t have specific dates in it — you never know if an inspection will be delayed, etc. — but that still gives the seller a sense that you’re a serious buyer provided they have fairly described the vehicle.
   
   Most of the folks I talked to who had made remote purchases from private parties used Paypal or Venmo to make their deposit after having a signed agreement with the seller agreeing to the terms of the deposit. Since you run the risk of losing your deposit — honestly, if you’re working with a dishonest seller there won’t be a ton you can do to prevent it — I recommend making the deposit an amount you are willing to lose if the deal goes sideways. Start with offering $500 and try and not go above $1,000 depending on the asking price for the car, and of course the deposit will be a credit against the purchase of the car if you are going to complete the purchase;
4. Always get a pre-purchase inspection. If you’re buying a used car sight-unseen you want a qualified mechanic to have a look on your behalf first. Getting a seller to take the car to a shop on your behalf can be problematic — it will take them time and has the potential to uncover issues they did not disclose or even know about — but the only advice I can give you in good conscious is to require a PPI if they want to sell you the car. Even if they have good paperwork and say that they recently had the car inspected, you don’t know the seller and have no reason to fully trust their assertions and documentation.
   
   The right way to approach the process of buying remotely is to do your homework and find a shop as close to the seller as possible who has a good reputation for working on the make of car you’re looking at. You need to call them and confirm that they will do pre-purchase inspections, at what cost, and generally how long does it take to get one scheduled. Go ahead and tell them about the car you’re looking at — they may already know the car depending on how large the town you’re trying to buy in — but make sure if they do know they car and current owner that they are willing to do a objective pre-purchase inspection for you and send you the results directly. You will be paying for the inspection, not the seller, and so the information gained is for you to use as part of the transaction if you decide to move forward. We will cover PPI in greater detail in just a bit so for now just make note that my advice is to never buy a used car remotely that you can’t get inspected first;
5. Have someone you trust look at the car for you. This can be more difficult depending on where you are trying to buy from and the life you’ve lived so far but it can be hugely valuable when buying remotely. Sending someone to look at the car on your behalf tells the seller that you’re serious and that you have resources local to them if you need them. It also, thanks to modern technology, allows you to “see” the car virtually and ask questions about what you’re seeing in real-time.
   
   What I have always done when buying cars remotely is look to my personal and professional networks to find someone in the same city as the seller to see if they could look at the car for me. I have been lucky that I am reasonably well traveled and have friends, college classmates, and professional contacts in a lot of places in the United States, and I recognize that this advice is less practical depending on the life you’ve lived. When I find someone who is in the right geography I usually start with an email asking if they’d be willing to spend an hour of their time looking at a car for me and to chat or videoconference with me while they look. Tell them you’re not looking for someone with car knowledge; you just need someone to look closely at paint, gaps, wheels, tires, and the interior and underside of the car to be a set of eyes for you. Really what you need is someone to point a cell phone running FaceTime or something similar at the car for you, looking in more detail at stuff that doesn’t look quite right.
   
   Depending on the kind of car you’re looking at you may find that folks are more than happy to look for you because, honestly, most folks don’t get to look at collectable cars up close all that often. My “ask to accept” rate for remote purchases is 100% for old air cooled Porsche, and in both cases the folks looking for me were only casually interested in cars but were delighted to get to look at a classic old Porsche up close;
6. Make sure to have EVERYTHING in writing. This is of course true with any transaction, but you want to make sure that you have everything they have declared regarding the car in writing. Email is best, and usually if I am talking to a seller on the phone I keep notes and then email them after the call to say “just to make sure I heard you correctly you said X, and Y, and Z about the car, correct?” Phrase your email in such a way that it’s clear that you’d like them to confirm via email that yes, you did hear them correctly. It’s not even that you’d use the email in court — it’s not really practical to sue out-of-state private sellers to be honest and except in rare circumstances the law is likely not on your side anyway — but having a clear record of how the car is represented will help you keep track of what you’re likely to get when the transport arrives and what issues, if any, you’re going to need to deal with. Additionally, depending on how many cars you buy and own, you may find that as you dig in and start repairing or modifying the car, having a written record of what the previous owner did to the car will save you time, money, or both.
   
   My best example of this is on my 1994 Porsche 911 factory wide-body where the seller casually mentioned during the purchase process that the original dual-mass flywheel had been swapped out with a lightweight single-mass flywheel. At the time I didn’t think anything of it other than “sure, that sounds like a reasonable thing do it and no doubt it saved on the weight of the car overall.” After a few months of driving the car I realized that when the car was still cool the engine would die if I stopped on any kind of incline without giving the car some extra gas when I pushed in the clutch to shift into neutral. At first I worried that there was something wrong with the fuel system or the engine overall … an issues that could be very expensive and time-consuming to diagnose … but as I went back through my purchase paperwork I came across my note on the flywheel. A quick Google search of “single mass flywheel Porsche 964 engine dying” led me to a very helpful forum that described the problem exactly as I was experiencing it plus the easy and low-cost solution. All because I remembered to write down the random modification the seller mentioned to me at the time I purchased the car;
7. Make sure you know how you will be paying for the car. Assuming you are doing the entire transaction remotely I strongly recommend using some type of escrow service to handle the movement of funds from you to your seller. Services like Escrow.com provide the ability to hold funds in escrow until the vehicle and title are successfully delivered and inspected and allow you to account for lien holders, shipping fees, etc. and were highly recommended by collectors that I interviewed for the book. There are fees associated with these services as you’d expect but at the time I wrote this paragraph Escrow.com was only charging $445 USD to manage a $50,000 USD escrow for a vehicle purchase, 0.89% of the transaction amount.
   
   As an alternative you can always either have your proxy make the payment for you upon collection of the car, keys, and title or, if you have the time, you can always travel to collect the car yourself. The latter is probably like the best way to do it since you get to see the car for yourself before you complete the transaction but, of course, if you spend the money and time it takes to travel to the car and it’s not as advertised then you’re out the cost of the trip. The former is not a bad idea — asking your proxy to facilitate the payment — but it will introduce more complexity in trying to get your friend back to the car and you’d want to be sure you really trust the friend before having them collect the keys and title for a car that you paid for;
8. Make sure you know how you will get the title. This may not come as a surprise but I do not recommend your seller put the title for the vehicle in the car so that they are both delivered at the same time. While it seems like a reasonable and timesaving idea, titles are painful to replace if they get lost, stolen, or damaged. Instead I recommend you negotiate with your seller to ship the title via UPS or FedEx overnight and require a signature upon delivery so that you have a tracking number and can both be confident that the title will make it from seller to buyer safely.
   
   By the way, make sure your seller completes their part of the title paperwork before they ship the document and includes a copy of the bill of sale with the title just so you’re sure to have it. Many states require the bill of sale — including the purchase price — in order to register the vehicle and will hold up registration if either the buyer or seller fails to complete the paperwork properly. The last thing you want to do is have to track down someone in another state who already has your money and ask them for more help with something you could have taken care of while you still have leverage, e.g., had not sent them a check or authorized the payment from escrow;
9. Make sure you know how the car will be getting to you and about how long it will take to arrive. There are few things in the car collecting universe that are less satisfying than having to wait days or weeks to have a car you’ve purchased to be delivered. You spent all the time to find the right car, make sure it’s as advertised, and negotiate the perfect deal … only to wait three weeks to even see the thing. And while it’s tempting to finish the deal and tell the seller “I’ll be there next week, have the gas tank full …” that isn’t always the most practical way to collect your new purchase assuming you have a job, a family, and responsibilities.
   
   One alternative is to use an auto broker to have the car picked up and delivered. While we cover this in greater detail in the chapter “Managing Auto Shippers Can Be a Full-Time Job” there are dozens of auto transport brokers that you can pay to be the middleman between you and the army of car and truck carriers that cross the country every day. A broker will help you find a driver who is “going your way” and charge you a premium over the delivery fee for the help and make it sound like your car will be there quickly. The problem with auto brokers is that there are an awful lot of them and ultimately they don’t own the delivery trucks, manage the delivery process, or accept much responsibility if things go wrong. Plus brokers have a reputation for costs going up when compared to initial estimates, usually due to the difference between the “lowest cost” estimate the will provide to get you interested and the actual price they can negotiate from a carrier for the exact delivery route.
   
   Another alternative is to call specific carriers and negotiate with them to have your car picked up and delivered. While this allows you better access to the people who will actually be handling your car, often times carriers are more expensive and slower to complete the delivery due to the size of their fleet and their existing commitments. That and the likelihood that you don’t know any car carrier companies off the top of your head since having cars delivered isn’t something most people do with any frequency. Personally I have only really dealt with one: Reliable Carriers, Inc. While I wouldn’t call them fast or particularly affordable, Reliable are, well, reliable, and they move an awful lot of luxury and collectable cars across the United States. If you aren’t in a huge hurry and want to make sure that folks who really understand the nuances of moving cars are taking care of your purchase, these are the folks to call.
   
   Finally, assuming you have already started collecting cars and have a local shop that does maintenance for you, or if you’ve made a purchase through a local multi-car dealership, it can’t hurt to ask them if they can help. The latter has a strong dependency on transport and so may have a contract in place that they will use to get your car to you for a fee or as a courtesy assuming you’re paying for the actual transport. Auto repair shops typically have a lower dependency on moving cars regionally or nationally but if they are performance shops, support racing teams, or do any business via online auctions they may have someone they trust who can help you as well. Plus, they may be extra motivated to help you get the car home since eventually it will need service.
   
   Again I will cover the nuances of auto transport in subsequent chapters so skip ahead if you’re ready to make that remote purchase right away;
10. Be ready to be mildly disappointed. No matter how much diligence and effort you put into a sight-unseen automobile purchase you always have the potential to be disappointed. Maybe the paint wasn’t as nice as it looked in photos, maybe your friend didn’t think to look up in the wheel wells and there is rust, maybe the car just isn’t nearly as fun to drive as your thought it would be … there are a hundred things that can go wrong when you buy something as involved and as complicated as a car without seeing it, smelling it, and driving it yourself.
    
    But hey, if you know this going into it then you’re at least prepared, and if you’re really going to get into car collecting then mild disappointment will just be something you get used to since it’s more or less inevitable. The flip side of this, and the thing that a lot of collectors I know get excited about, is the process of fixing the stuff you missed so that you can restore the car to it’s original state or modify it to be the exact car you wanted anyway!

Risk Mitigation Using a Buyer’s Agent

One thing you might want to consider if you’re planning to buy a car sight unseen is working with a local dealership and have them act as a “buyer’s agent” for your transaction. Especially if you’re already into car collecting and have made local purchases, you may be able to convince a smaller dealer to help facilitate the inspection, paperwork, transport, etc. for a small fee or commission. If you want to try this I recommend the following:

1. Work with a dealership you already know and trust. Mostly because they are more likely to want to help you if there is an existing relationship but also because you will already know what to expect in terms of response times and communication in general. When you’re trying to buy any car that is desirable you’re on the clock, and if you lose a deal because your agent was slow to move it will be a drag. If you can work with an agent that has already proven they are able to respond quickly and communicate effectively you will be better off;
2. Negotiate your fee or commission in advance. Some dealers who are willing to serve as a buyer’s agent will already have a fee structure in place; others might be willing to help you but not have enough experience to know what to charge you. Either way you want to make sure you’re 100% clear on what their help will cost you, either a flat fee, an hourly rate, or a percentage of the purchase price of the car, before you have them start helping you. And make sure to have that agreement in writing with clarity around when and how much of the payment is due if the transaction falls apart for any reason. Personally I’d be most comfortable paying an hourly rate for whatever service they provided, that way if they deal falls apart I am only paying for the help received up until that happened, but your mileage may vary and the dealer may have a structured way to approach payments as well;
3. Make sure to tell the seller you’re working with an agent. In theory they won’t mind if you let them know you have hired a professional on your end to facilitate the process since that will make the process go more smoothly for them as well. Let them know that you’re paying for all associated fees for the agent’s help — which is only reasonable since using the agent is your decision. If the seller balks then that should be a red flag regarding the car or seller; if the seller was hoping to hide something and get away with it based on most people’s inexperience buying cars, knowing that an experienced agent is involved may scare them away … and that’s a good thing;
4. Listen to what your agent is telling you. If you’re going to take the time to find and pay an expert for their help you want to be sure to actually listen to them. If they start saying things like “this car looks great but …” and “if it were my money I would be walking away” you want to seriously consider the advice. Unless they have a similar car to sell you — which if they did, honestly, you should be looking at that not a car you can’t actually see in person — their only skin in the game is helping you make a good decision. Ignoring good advice is basically throwing money away, potentially a lot of it depending on how much you are being asked to pay for the car;
5. Do not blame your agent if something goes wrong. Unless a problem arises that is 100% their fault — they don’t respond in time, don’t get a document signed, don’t arrange for reliable transportation, etc. — then you need to keep in mind that the decision to purchase the car (or not) is your decision, not theirs. When something goes wrong in life it’s human nature to want to blame someone else, but you want to be very careful to assign blame unfairly to a buyer’s agent because it can impact your reputation and their likelihood of wanting to work with you again in the future. If you make a mistake and lose the car, own that mistake because trust me, there will always be another car;
6. If you get the car, offer to let your agent drive it or at least take them for a ride. In all of my years of car collecting I have never met a car dealer or mechanic who wasn’t also a full on car person. Given that they very likely share your passion for cars, if they help you with the transaction you’re wise to let them see and experience your new toy. It’s as likely as not they will decline, but it’s polite to offer, even if you’re paying them for their time since an awful lot of car collecting comes down to relationships. You’d rather be known as a generous collector who is willing to share their cars, at least with a limited audience, than one of those guys who just hordes cars and hides them away. Trust me on this one.

Okay I think I have covered pretty much everything you need to know to buy a car. Ideally you will find a car local to you — even if that means some driving — so that you can have a close look and test drive before you get too far down the purchase path. Sometimes you won’t be so lucky and the car you need to buy is too far away to see in which case you hope it’s at a trustworthy dealership or with an honest seller. And sometimes the car will get away from you and that’s okay, there will always be another and maybe you’ll get lucky the next time.

Still, there is one more major path to purchase for automobiles that isn’t necessarily buying locally or remotely and not exactly like buying from a dealer or a private seller: buying a car at auction.