Recently I have been coming across alot of ads on Gumtree advertising Import cars. I am now aware of the dangers of buying these cars from the bond yards down in Durban. This is what happend to me. 3 years ago my car blew a head gasket and I was not in the position to buy another one, I turned to Gumtree to see what I could find and came across a ad offering a 2004 VW Golf 4 for R30000, I thought that I had come across a real bargain so I called, it seemed pretty legitimate so I borrowed a car and went down to Durban to check out the deal. I sat on the side of the road for about 2 hours until someone arrived, ironically in a golf 4. We drove to a bond yard and it seemed a little odd to me that everything was so secretive about passports and id's, I went in and saw many cars that I liked and decided on one. Luckily I did not have the cash on me that day as the guy demanded it but I said that I would get it to him that week, he speed off annoyed that I had not payed him. That week I tried to call him as I wanted to know when I should get him the money but there was no answer, I then drove down to the yard I where I had looked at the car and was told that the guy that I was going to hand over R30000 to had been arrested. I was shocked at the statement and decided to delve deeper into this now well known scam, there are hundreds of reports of this scam taking as much as R100000. Has anybody on here had a similar experience? Thanks
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Import Scam
- Thread starter w203ck
- Start date
scudsucker
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The imported cars you are talking about cannot be legally sold in South Africa, nor re-imported, without a huge tax being added.
So count yourself lucky you didn't get swindled.
As a rule: if the deal is too good to be true, it is.
So count yourself lucky you didn't get swindled.
As a rule: if the deal is too good to be true, it is.
Neoprod
Honorary Master
came in here expecting something about wantitall.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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As an aside: Watch out for scams in our local classifieds and vehicle selling websites selling cars a bit and more below market price. They also create their own websites. Usually they claim to be businesses. We have an extremely active Cameroonian scammer community in South Africa taking pics and descriptions form real sellers, copying it apart from the price. In turn some local peeps copy the Cameroonians.
Just saying ...
Just saying ...
ToxicBunny
Oi! Leave me out of this...
As always, if the deal looks too good to be true, the chances are it is.
If the person selling the item wants money up front etc etc etc... just walk away.
Jet-Fighter7700
Honorary Master
one question I always had though;
in the OP case he blew a head gasket; what if he tried to swap around a head gasket from one of those JDM imports?
surely that would still be legal? I mean are parts from JDM cars allowed to be imported and used in SA?
otherwise how do those guys from japanauto operate? dont they strip parts from JDM cars in botswana and them import the parts into SA?
in the OP case he blew a head gasket; what if he tried to swap around a head gasket from one of those JDM imports?
surely that would still be legal? I mean are parts from JDM cars allowed to be imported and used in SA?
otherwise how do those guys from japanauto operate? dont they strip parts from JDM cars in botswana and them import the parts into SA?
Another scam that you should watch out for is called paragraphs.