Mechanic warns about the ‘listing for a friend’ car selling scam
So you were scrolling listings for cars the other day and saw something weird. One description specified “selling this car for a friend.” You wondered, Who needs their friend just to list a vehicle on Facebook Marketplace? The truth may be that the posting was part of a scam.
According to multiple Redditors and one mechanic, there may be more to this car buying situation than meets the eye. Yes, the seller doesn’t “own” this car. But often, that’s because their bank owns it. They’ll ask you to pay for the car, promising their “friend” will send you the vehicle’s title ASAP. But if they are lying, their actual plan may be to take your money, go to their bank, pay off their loan, get the title, then send it to you.
Can this situation go wrong? Absolutely. What if they get to their bank and discover some fee they didn’t know about? Suddenly they can’t afford to pay off their car and you’re out of luck. Or what if they just get lazy and you must wait weeks to get the title and register your new car?
When a Redditor asked the /r/Autos forum about this situation, one commenter had a concise word of wisdom: “Once you hand them money, you have no leverage to force them to perform on their obligation to provide a title.”
At the end of the day, if the bank still has the title and owns the car, the bank can repossess it. They don’t care that it’s parked in front of your house, and they don’t care who you handed a chunk of change to.
How to avoid the ‘selling for a friend’ car buying scam
So do you have options? Absolutely. If the seller will come clean and explain there’s a lien on the car (aka, they owe money on the car and their bank technically owns it), you can still buy it. One option is to drive to the bank together. Instead of trusting the “seller” with your cash, the two of you hand the money over to the bank, which hands back the title.
Not everyone thinks it’s worth the hassle. David Long is a mechanic who goes by the “Car Wizard” on his popular YouTube channel. When he listed eight vehicle-buying situations to avoid at all costs, he said to skip listings that say “selling for a friend.” You can see the rest of his red flags in the video embedded below:
