|
|
Posted by D Sherman [72.47.153.24] on Thursday, January 26, 2012 at 12:00:20 :
In Reply to: Re: O/T SELLING RANT posted by 64crewcabs [75.227.167.222] on Wednesday, January 25, 2012 at 20:55:59 :
I think it's reasonable, if you've been talking to somebody over the internet, to give them a while to come and look at it or decide to buy it. Nobody would give serious thought to any rig any distance away if they thought the seller was going to sell to the first guy that showed up with cash in hand, maybe at much less than the price you were willing to pay. On the other hand, the seller can't be expected to wait forever while some tire-kicker thinks about it.
It seems to me that if you really intend to sell to the first guy with cash in hand, no matter how seriously somebody else might have been talking to you about it, you should stick to advertising in the local want ads or craigslist and say clearly that the first guy with $XXXX OBO gets it. If you're hard up and need money in a hurry, that's the way to go.
On the other hand, a special-interest vehicle is going to bring a better price if you advertise it nation-wide. You can't tell who's serious and who's a "tire-kicker" long distance, but just like you don't want to waste your time with "tire-kickers", serious buyers aren't going to waste their time with a seller who's likely to sell it out from under them to somebody else while they're still in serious negotiations, which sounds like what happened here.
The way to make long-distance negotiations work fairly is to set time limits ("I will come and look at it next weekend", or "I will make you an offer by Friday and mail you a deposit immediately") or at least keep the discussions moving by responding to emails and phone calls within a day. I appreciate the frustration on both sides, but all you can really ask of people is that they be honest. On the seller's side, that means making it clear that you will sell it locally to the first guy with cash if that's what you intend to do, and on the buyer's side, that means making a decision quickly and telling the seller as soon as you realize you're not all that interested, really can't afford it, or are too busy to drive out to see it any time soon.