HIGH POINT, N.C. — You already know to look for red flags buying cars on Craigslist, and over Facebook because we’ve seen a lot of scammers there. But now you also have to watch out when visiting car dealers’ websites. It could really be a scammer pretending to be a local dealer you know and trust.
In the rearview mirror, High Point Crescent Ford’s sales manager, Sam knows now that something was off.
“One Saturday morning I took this phone call and the guy was asking for two different vehicles we had in stock,” he said.
Two cars the guy saw online, but there weren’t on the lot and never had been.
“These were vehicles he claimed he was told to come see. He had set up an appointment," Sam said.
Not long after, the Dealers’ Association sent around a warning from Tennessee about phony websites created and operated by scammers posing as a legitimate auto dealer.
“I’m thinking, hey this may have been it, it may have been hitting a little closer to home. I think somebody was impersonating something," Sam said.
HOW IT WORKS
The scammers want you to make a down payment or even a fee to hold the car before you come see it on the lot. They get you revved up to buy by marketing fake cars that are thousands of dollars cheaper than the real prices.
The FBI says more than 27,000 people have complained about fake online car sales since 2014. Costing American’s more than $54 million.
Lechelle Yates with the Better Business Bureau says this scam is so new, it’s easy to see how people could fall for it. But there is one big warning sign!
RED FLAG WARNING SIGN
“Asking to pay with gift cards is the biggest red flag of any scam. Gift cards are for one thing and one thing only: for giving as a gift. They are not for making payments for anything!" Yates said.
The scammers might also ask for a cashier’s check or for you to wire money. Sam says some car dealers will actually ask you for a fee to hold the car but they only want you to pay by credit card, a charge that can later be disputed if it turns out to be a scam.
One more quick trick. Make sure to always put the dealer’s address on the website into Google maps and check out the satellite view. Experts say a lot of these fake sites will list addresses that clearly aren’t the car dealership. Like apartment buildings, or even an empty plot of land.