jpwiggo wrote:
Every car I have bought in the past. I walk into a dealership, write a personal check and then drive a car away right then. Bought three used cars for my three boys this way. Just did another one this week.
The dealer told me that he would hold the title until my out of state personal check cleared. Then mail me the title. I drove away.
Everything we do has risk, but I don't see a negative to taking a personal check. Now if I did not get a good feel for the person, or got bad vibes - that's different.
I did some research and yes if they pass a bad check -it is grand theft auto, if they don't make good on the funds. Insurance covers scams and theft.
Again, not transferring the title, and keeping my own tags.
People wish to assume that because it is Illegal and the dealer has insurance, all is good with them. Having been down that road more than once, I can assure you it is not. Insurance never pays the full loss and getting law enforcement involved with fraud across state lines or even locally can be very difficult in retail sales.
What the public does and what dealers do should never be confused. I often took checks and delivered cars but my people also took steps to limit the liability. On a minimum we made an effort to verify the check and to look up the people and address to confirm validity. Often we ran a credit report. If you can actually verify the person is listed as a resident at the address on the check and if they have good credit, you are most likely good to go. Still, not always.Even on purchases from our Rolls Royce store, if we did not know the people and the check was for the whole car, the only acceptable payment method was a wire transfer. We did not accept cashiers checks.
