My faith in humanity has been restored - what would you do ?

Sold a crane a few years ago (thanks CARB...) to a guy starting a business in Utah, he hired a driveway service to get it to Utah. Coming down the hill to state line the guy over revved the Caterpillar and caused about 7k in damage. The new owner called me distraught as he scrapped every penny together for the purchase so I called a mechanic I knew in Vegas and paid to have it towed / repaired. It was sold as is and was running perfect but I had witnessed him scraping and borrowing every cent he could to purchase it and I felt like it was the right thing to do. Off road toys are different though but it sounds like this guy met your request (y)
 
Attitude is everything. Used is used and buyer beware. If something happens after the fact/sale, it's really not on the seller, unless you can prove a blatant lie. If you come at me threatening to sue, then Pound Sand and lets go to court!, if you come humble and with a clear path, then lets work it out together and get things right!!
 
MGMFRP said:
Attitude is everything. Used is used and buyer beware. If something happens after the fact/sale, it's really not on the seller, unless you can prove a blatant lie. If you come at me threatening to sue, then Pound Sand and lets go to court!, if you come humble and with a clear path, then lets work it out together and get things right!!
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100%
 
I’m not sure a check showing up after threat of a lawsuit would restore my faith in humanity..

That said it’s good he stepped up and did what most would consider the right thing.

I sold an XP1000 awhile back to a friend and found out later that they drove it like 3 times locally before the transmission grenaded.. I guess it’s a common problem with their Chinese bearings after a couple thousand miles.

I had found out that it grenaded through some mutual friends. So I called them and took them to lunch and gave them 500.00 towards a replacement.

RD
 
Would you have really taken him to court? Or was it just a hollow threat to get money out of him? Do you think you would've won? Could you have PROVEN that he knew about the damage or that he lied to you? When you called trying to get info about who did the work did you first explain that you weren't trying to put the responsibility of fixing it on him?? Or is it likely that he thought you were going to try and stick him with the bill? Chris's question is valid; what would you have done if the situation was reversed?

It kind of looks like he restored your faith in humanity while you destroyed whatever faith he may have had.
 
Thank you everyone for the replies. It is good to see all the perspectives on a uncomfortable situation. To add to my reasoning for saying I would go to small claims court is because my temper got the better or me. It pissed me off that he would not answer the phone or respond to text. I only wanted information on exactly what work he had done as my friends were trying to help diagnose what had happened to the Rzr. I wasn't expecting any compensation I was just trying to figure out why it shut down. When I told friends that the seller claimed he just replaced the top end, they were wanting more details to help diagnose.

Once the shop opened it up and explained to me what had happened, I was already pissed that he wouldn't give me a courtesy response earlier so I sent him a text letting him know I was frustrated for ghosting on me and if he wasn't willing to at least respond, I would try my hand at small claims court.

To also answer the question of what would I do if I was the seller. The answer is easy. I would have kept the line of communication open and I would have offered money or the option to take it back and refund his money. I have done this on several occasions with something that I flipped. As a seller I am as transparent as I can be. I have had several deals go bad and I refunded the money on a couple and paid for repairs on a couple others.

In this instance I already had the Rzr pre-sold to Vinnie (Chop Shop) as soon as I returned from it's maiden voyage. In this case it could have happened to him vs me and I would have given him the choice of taking it back or paying for repairs. He was expecting to pick it up from me on a Monday after the trip and joked about not messing it up. Fortunately it didn't get that far.
 
RiverDave said:
Would you?
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I wouldn't have bitched out and threatened to take him to court because my unstable emotions got the best of me. Jim hustles shit all the time, and the majority of people on this board know it.. Win some, lose some. He flipped it before he even drove it. Take it on the chin like a big boy.
 
Sold this FZ1 to a kid coming up from New Zealand. He planned to ride the bike all over the USA over the next year and he found my ad on craigslist. I had done almost all of the maintenance on the bike. Had put 30 of the 35K on it and new what its issues were (Popped out of second at high revs) and disclosed them. I also disclosed the recent work the bike had. New x ring chain and good sprockets, tires, etc. The bike had new fork seals installed by my local yamaha dealer 3000 miles ago. That was a selling point. Got a text from the kid (Great kid by the way). He had blown out a fork seal in Utah and fork oil had saturated the brake pads. He had it in a shop there getting repaired. I reimbursed him for the whole job including new pads and labor. I suspect the yamaha dealer intentionally nicked a fork tube to cause the seal to wear faster so he could see me in again. Since I sold the bike as having new fork seals installed, I felt compelled to cover the cost. Used stuff is generally buy at your own risk unless the seller intentionally guarantees something.
 

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