Bring a Trailer is a major marketplace in the enthusiast car world. It’s supposed to work like any other auction site; people bid, somebody wins, and then the buyer pays for the car and the seller hands it over. But recent auctions for two JDM Suzukis didn’t go like that at all, with the high-bidders thinking they scored a deal on a no-reserve listing, only to be disappointed by a ridiculous situation that raises questions about how much buyers can really trust online car auctions.
We’ve discussed the perils of “no reserve” auctions before. The simple fact is you’re expected to give up your vehicle for whatever price the auction ends at. If it’s lower than you wanted, that’s too bad—you agreed to sell, come what may. Now and then, that leaves a seller with hurt feelings and a bank account a little slimmer than they would have liked.
Earlier this month, something curious happened on Bring a Trailer. Two buyers of classic kei cars both reported a seller for allegedly refusing to provide the vehicle at the final no-reserve-auction bid. One auction gone bad is a footnote, but two on the same day is a story. The further we dug in, the murkier things got.
No Reserve!
Our story begins with a van. Take a look at this Bring a Trailer auction for a 1988 Suzuki Every EPi Turbo. It’s a diminutive four-wheel-drive machine with forced induction and a five-speed transmission, imported from Japan — a desirable enthusiast car.
The vehicle was listed for sale by BaT user 5starjdm, apparently based in New Jersey. It went to auction and sold for $5,876 to user Cheesebrgreddi on June 30. Only, the next day, there appeared to be a problem:
“This seller is refusing to sell the vehicle to me at this price even though it was listed on a no-reserve auction,” wrote Cheesebrgreddi in the comments. “I would not recommend anyone doing business with these people in the future. What a joke.”
The Suzuki Every auction appeared to have gone wrong—but it wasn’t the only one. Commenters pointed to a 1996 Suzuki Carry fire truck that 5starjdm had sold the same day. The no-reserve auction closed for $7,800. The next day, auction winner Zangadousa posted in excitement that they would soon pick up the vehicle. Ten minutes later they wrote in the comments of the listing that they were reaching out to Bring A Trailer for help. “Seller is saying he is not selling the truck for the auction price… what do I do now?”
Bring a Trailer’s comment system makes it difficult for us to reach the buyers and sellers directly, but I attempted nonetheless to find out what happened after the fact. Here’s what I dug up.
Listing Says Private Party, But It Appears To Be A Dealership
A second comment from Cheesebrgreddi caught my eye. The buyer drew some conclusions from their communications with 5starjdm after the auction. “I assume he will be removed from here but who knows,” they stated. “The auction says private party but from the emails I got he is clearly a dealer.” Basically, the listings on Bring a Trailer indicated the vehicles were being sold by an individual, but Cheesebrgreddi didn’t think that was the case.
There was evidence to suggest that the “5starjdm” account is associated with or operated by an import car dealer. Videos shared on Bring a Trailer are hosted on the Japstar Imports channel on YouTube. A 1989 Rover Mini was also recently listed by 5starjdm on Bring a Trailer, and failed to sell because that one auction had a reserve set.; what appears to be the same car also appears on the website of Japstar Imports. Japstar is located in Pennsuaken, the same area of New Jersey as listed on the 5starjdm account.
As I investigated on June 17, I saw that Japstar’s website also links to another website that sells kei trucks—a dealer called Street Legal Mini Trucks. The dealer website was listing a 1996 Suzuki Carry fire truck that appears to match the one recently listed on Bring a Trailer, with matching mileage to boot. It was up for $17,500—a long way above the no-reserve sale price of $7,800. Street Legal Mini Trucks also listed a 1988 Suzuki Every Turbo that appears identical to the one on BaT (though with different mileage) with a note that the vehicle was “GOING TO COLLECTOR CAR AUCTION.”
It was time to start asking some serious questions.
The Seller’s View
I reached out to JapStar Imports and the associated Street Legal Mini Trucks website, hoping to gain some clarification on what went down. Sales manager “Alex A.” indicated that things had gone sideways before the cars were even listed. “The 1996 Carry firetruck sold for $18,000 around June 10 before it was listed for sale on bring a trailer,” Alex told me via e-mail. “I alerted the bat staff that I already had the vehicle potentially sold.” Despite this, the auction went ahead, and things spiraled from there.
“They said since I already submitted payment and they had already spent time (about 1 month) putting the listing together that I needed to follow through with the listing,” Alex alleged. “I made a post that the vehicle was sold outside bat when the listing went active, [but] the people at bat deleted my post and gave me a warning.”
The results of the auction did not please Alex, who mentioned the winning bidder on Bring a Trailer: “When the bidding finally ended at a super low bid amount it was funny the ‘winning bidder’ was so quick to want to pick it up the same day because he knew it sold way too cheap and he was trying to get over on the deal,” said Alex. “Can’t even buy that truck in Japan for only $8000 in such perfect condition with such low miles.”
Ultimately, Alex told us he had sold the vehicle to a buyer outside Bring a Trailer and that the deal was done. “Anyways I personally delivered the truck to its new owner in Tennessee and he couldn’t have been happier,” he said.
Alex’s email raised a few new questions. He’d apparently sold the truck on June 10, but hadn’t taken payment. The auction still went up, and as it proceeded on June 30, Alex made several comments answering bidder’s questions and encouraging them to buy the vehicle.
The auction ended on that day, June 30, even though Alex had apparently sold the truck off-site and would later deliver it for $18,000. And yet, strangely, the truck remained listed for sale on the dealer’s website for $17,500 for over a month after it had “sold” on June 10, and well after the BaT auction had ended.
In his initial emails to The Autopian, Alex claimed the truck was “sold” as of June 10, though he also later uses the term “potentially sold.” In any case, he provided the above images in an email telling us he personally delivered the truck to a buyer in Tennessee. The metadata of the images indicate they were taken minutes apart on July 16. This, and his comments on June 30, seem to suggest that Alex still had possession of the vehicle several weeks after the Bring a Trailer auction concluded – and over a month after the vehicle was apparently “sold” on June 10.
Alex’s reply only accounted for the fire truck; there was no explanation of what happened with the Suzuki Every van.
David Calls The Seller To Answer Some Of These Questions
David Tracy, The Autopian’s Editor-in-Chief, reached out to Alex for some clarifications. First, he wanted to know why Alex had been commenting on Bring a Trailer if the fire truck was already sold. The nature of Alex’s comments seem to imply that he was still open to sell the vehicle. This comment for example:
@Zangadousa – The truck does not come with AC but AC can easily be added for an extra charge should the winning bidder decide to have it installed. Thank you
And especially this one:
@SWEQS – You should buy the truck and start a Youtube channel dedicated to mini firetruck ASMR videos!! Would be an amazing way to become youtube famous! haha 🙂
Alex said he was commenting because he knew the buyer was paying attention. “The buyer was watching the Bring a Trailer auctions, too,” he told David. “So he saw everything… I wanted the buyer to know that it is actually 4wd, because he was watching everything.”
Alex is referring to this comment:
@solidlifters – The truck says 4WD all over the place for a reason. Please look at photo #157 under the vehicle you can clearly see transfer case with drive shafts going to the front and rear, and a differential in the front and a differential in the rear. Thank you.
“I was just joking around,” Alex said, emphasizing that he wasn’t really considering selling the truck on Bring a Trailer “because my buyer already put the money down.” Alex told David that he was commenting to “play along,” saying “I’ll play along with their game. They don’t want to delete it. I’ll play along. There’s no law against that.”
When David asked Alex if he could see why it might seem that he was still considering selling it on Bring a Trailer if the bidding had gone high enough, Alex denied it, but said: “I could do that, too… there’s no law against that. I could have refunded the buyer his money and gave it to someone else…Until money is exchanged and the vehicle crosses hands, the vehicle is still owned by someone… But I’m saying, I had the vehicle sold. I wanted [the auction] ended…. I said I had the vehicle sold — please don’t list it.”
Alex later sent an email reply to David’s question (bold mine):
#3 Why did you continue participating in the BaT auction (by commenting on June 30) if the vehicle had already sold on June 10?
– I continued participating in the BAT auction (only a little bit) because I kept getting emails from the BAT people saying that I needed to participate.
– I participated a little bit because the buyer of the truck saw the auction listing and they were following it also. I answered some of the questions so the buyer wouldn’t feel worried that the truck wasn’t 4WD, and someone asked if the siren worked and I wanted the buyer to see that yes it does work by answering the persons question.
– Also, I was hoping that the sale price would be much higher because I had already sold this truck for $18,000 and I didn’t want the price to end too low and have the customer feel bad that he paid so much for the vehicle. But $18,000 is a fair price for a brand new truck with super low miles in brand new condition. It is not a secret that super mint condition vehicles with super low miles sell for high prices on BAT, at least it was the place to sell super mint condition super low mile vehicles for high prices, but apparently it is not the case anymore.
As for why the truck was on his site well after it had allegedly been sold and well after the auction, Alex said:
“We have so many cars…there’s like five or six that are still showing as active that are already sold…we do that just because sometimes there’s similar vehicles, and people might want one, and we… it’s hard to explain…I just didn’t’ have time and i got other stuff going on.”
According to Alex, it’s a common practice for him to keep vehicles listed on the site even when they’re not available. In an email, he noted that search engine optimization (SEO) was a key reason cars remained on the site. “Someone might be searching for XYZ vehicle, it would come up on our website as available or sold… if it shows as sold then 99% of the time people will not contact,” he explained. He also noted it was useful for making it appear “the dealer has a lot more vehicles available” and that it can help customers compare prices. “It’s not illegal to keep some sold vehicles mixed in the inventory list,” Alex told The Autopian via email.
As for the vehicle being sold as a private party when he is a dealership, “It was under a personal name…if it was titled under Japstar imports, then it would be a dealer car,” he said, saying the buyer would have been confused receiving a title under a personal name if the vehicle had been listed as a dealer car. Alex noted that he gave Bring a Trailer additional information that they requested about his friend, and that this had slowed down the listing process. Here’s Alex’s email response:
Also #5 – The vehicle was not listed as dealer auction because the vehicle is a customers vehicle titled under someone else’s name. Sure we brokered the deal but we only broker vehicles on consignment for customers. So it was a personal sale not a dealer sale. If the vehicle was titled under the business name and if the vehicle was owned by japstar imports then yes it would be a dealer sale and it would not be possible for us to say its a personal vehicle sale. BAT questioned us selling a vehicle that didn’t belong to us and they requested the phone number, photo of id, and email address of the person listed on the title which we promptly provided to them without any hesitation. Deal is done, buyer is happy, seller is happy. Only person not happy is the person that temporarily paid buyers premium of less than $400 for a day or two before BAT refunded them, but they have moved on and so has everyone else.
Why did it take so long to deliver the truck based on that delivery photo’s metadata? Some of it came down to trying to bundle a dropoff instead of doing multiple one-off trips, Alex says. “I’m not gonna go 10 hours to deliver the fire truck and then wait another 10 days to deliver the camo truck [located within an hour of the other truck],” he said, referencing the other vehicle in the photo, saying delays with payments also contributed to the mid-July dropoff.
As for why he didn’t have the buyer just bid on the truck on Bring a Trailer, Alex replied: “I’m not gonna make him pay $900 extra for nothing…”I’m not paying [that]…Because they wouldn’t’ take the ad down when I requested.”
Before the call was over, Alex made it clear how absurd he found the high bid, and that he had only agreed to a “no reserve” after Bring a Trailer had allegedly pushed for a no reserve auction. “That’s like a steal, that’s not a deal. That’s getting over on someone; that’s not fair to anyone…That’s why I wanted the reserve.”
BaT Responds To Our Inquiry
The Autopian approached Bring a Trailer after receiving the first statement from Alex A., seeking comment on the matter. In particular, regarding whether the website knew the vehicle had been sold ahead of time. Representatives for the website refused to provide any specific information on the auctions concerned. Instead, Bring a Trailer provided the following statement (bold ours):
Though we are not going to discuss the specifics of this situation out of respect for the privacy of the customers involved, I can say that we expect all buyers and sellers to follow through with their bids and sales on the site, and typically when that does not happen they are restricted from further participation on BaT. We also would never start an auction if we know that the vehicle is not available for sale, and there have been cases where we have stopped auctions due to miscommunications or misunderstandings around the availability of a car to transact. It’s also important to note that sellers must approve a draft of their listing prior to the start of the auction.
Any time we are made aware of a problem with a sale after an auction, whether that is via the comments or elsewhere, we have a specific customer service team that reaches out to both parties to try and resolve the situation. We may not always address it publicly in the comments, but in any situation in which a winning bidder is not able to purchase a vehicle through no fault of their own, their BaT fees are promptly refunded.
It’s worth noting that, regarding the seller having to approve the draft, here’s what the seller, Alex, said in an email:
#4 Bring a Trailer says all sellers have to approve of a draft prior to the listing going up; when and why did you approve of it if the vehicle was already sold?The draft was approved before the vehicle was sold. They took forever to list the vehicle, and I already told them the vehicle was potentially sold. And the day after they listed the vehicle I asked them to remove it or what’s the process like to take it down or whatever. They told me it’s not their standard practice to take listings down. I didn’t want to cause any problems with BAT because it’s not my website and I asked them if my buyer makes a bid for $18,000 if he can do so without having to pay buyer premium, but they said no (see screenshot)
At this point, the stories from each side didn’t match up. However, when queried, Alex had some receipts to share. “I have screenshots of the conversation with bat staff,” he told The Autopian on Friday. “I submitted the vehicle to be listed on June 2. I told them that I’m most likely selling the vehicle outside of BAT for 18k on june 17,” he explained. “They listed the truck on June 23, and on June 24 I notified them that the truck is basically already sold.”
The screenshots provided by Alex appear to show chats with Bring a Trailer staff. They are incomplete and there’s no way to verify them with the auction refusing to comment further, but they appear to show Alex notifying the website ahead of time that he might sell the vehicle outside of Bring a Trailer. However, there’s something else questionable here:
Remember when we stated the Bring a Trailer auctions were listed as “Private Party”? The screenshots appear to show Bring a Trailer staffer Steven Richards, Senior Manager of Auction Production; per the email screenshot, he had apparently “[come] up with a few questions about the sale / ownership situation on this one.” We don’t see the whole conversation, but Alex indicates that the truck is not titled in his name. “Yes the truck is titled in Jordan’s name so it is not ‘dealership’ it is private sale,” says Alex. “However I am the owner as I said I have the keys, I have the truck, and I have the title.”
Steve came back to Alex and indicated this was not acceptable. “We require all private sellers to have a title in their name,” said Steven. “If you are representing this sale as the owner we’ll need to see a title that has been issued in your name.” At this point in the conversation on June 18, Steven Richards indicated he was going out of town, and would be handing over the matter to another staffer.
The screenshots provided by Alex show that he told Bring a Trailer that he was the owner, while also stating the title was in “Jordan’s name.” This contradicts what he told us by email, that the vehicle was being sold on consignment for a customer. Either Alex owned a vehicle which still had a title in someone else’s name, or he didn’t own the vehicle and was selling it on consignment. He told Bring a Trailer one thing and told The Autopian another.
Ultimately, we don’t know if there was further conversation to resolve the title issue, but it appears Bring a Trailer went ahead with the listing. Both auction listings stated the vehicles were “offered at no reserve in New Jersey by the seller on behalf of the current owner,” with clean titles from the state of Maryland. In other words, if these screenshots are legitimate, it suggests Bring a Trailer did not consider Alex the owner, presumably knew he did not have a title in his name, and listed the vehicle as “private party.” Bring a Trailer could also have readily identified that Alex was a dealer from the YouTube videos he provided to his various listings from the Japstar Imports channel.
In any case, Alex claims to be surprised a few days later when the Bring a Trailer listing went up on June 23. However, it is worth noting that, per the images above, he’s willingly providing BaT with supporting documents on June 17, just six days prior to the listing:
Wires may have gotten crossed due to a staffing issue. With Steven Richards at Bring a Trailer taking leave, he presumably handed things over. Dmitri, an Auction Support Team Specialist, appears in a later chat log from June 23, when the auction had gone live. Alex indicates he had told BaT that he wished to sell the vehicle off-site, and asks if he can redirect his listing fee to another vehicle. Dmitri appears to have responded that this was not possible, indicating that the Bring a Trailer “expect that sellers honor their commitment to see the auction through to the end.” Noting a reluctance to remove live auctions, Dmitri instead recommends a different path forward. “Please encourage your buyer to place bids on the site along other bidders,” he suggests. Alex asks if the Bring a Trailer fees can be waived if his buyer bids. The provided chat screenshots do not show what the response from Bring a Trailer was beyond this point.
If these screenshots are legitimate, they suggest that Bring a Trailer may have listed a vehicle despite knowing the seller was trying to offload it elsewhere beforehand. However, again, it is worth noting that Alex says he “might go that route” and that money has not been exchanged. It doesn’t sound definitive.
There’s more, too. Remember how a Suzuki Carry fire truck was listed on Street Legal Mini Trucks for $17,500? Now, as of the time of writing on July 20, that vehicle is listed as sold. Meanwhile, the Suzuki Every van that was listed as “GOING TO COLLECTOR CAR AUCTION”? It’s up for sale at the lofty price of $15,995! There is a discrepancy in mileage—Street Legal Mini Trucks lists it as 121,645 kilometers, while Bring a Trailer has a photo of the Every van with 21,648 kilometers on the clock. However, the vehicle has a five-digit odometer that rolls over at 100,000 kilometers, so that would account for the discrepancy between the two reports. With access to the import documentation and pre-import records from Japan, Street Legal Mini Trucks would have some idea of whether the odometer had rolled over previously.
The Autopian repeatedly raised the issue of the Suzuki Every van with Alex. He did not acknowledge the van at any point in our communications.
As seen in images below, it appears Alex has had frustrations with no reserve auctions before. In 2019, the 5starjdm account sold a Suzuki Jimny in a no-reserve auction on Bring a Trailer, and was frustrated with the result. Perhaps if he’d learned from that incident, none of this would have happened.
Notably, Japstar Imports also appears on Yelp with a 2.6 star rating. There are a number of reviews posted, with one individual particularly noting issues around titles. “I bought a car in cash from Japstar Imports and I couldn’t get the car titled,” said Michael George M. of Wyckoff, New Jersey. “Alex pays you no mind after he already has your cash. Alex will lie to you about the title process in order to get your money which you will never see again if handed over.”
A Jimny sold on Bring a Trailer by 5starjdm in 2019. Credit: Bring a Trailer
Nonsense All Round
Several parties come out looking bad in this tale. Bring a Trailer listed a car as private party that was, at the very least, being sold on consignment by a dealer, which confused buyers and likely eroded trust. Worse, an auction was held with a seller unwilling to honor the results.
For a platform as big as Bring a Trailer, it’s understandable that things will sometimes go wrong. When you handle thousands upon thousands of sales, you get to the point where some fraction of those will fall through. Sellers will bail, buyers will refuse to pay—all kinds of things can happen.
What is harder to accept is the apparent failure of checks and balances indicated by the screenshots provided to The Autopian. Perhaps there is more to the story—particularly in chats outside the screenshots that were provided to us by Alex of Japstar Imports. However, with Bring a Trailer declining to comment on this case, we can only go with what we know. What we have seen doesn’t look great.
Situations like this can quickly erode trust in a dealership and an online sales platform. Buyers want to know that they’re getting a legitimate deal from a legitimate operator. They don’t want to buy a car from someone with a title in someone else’s name, and they don’t want to pay more for a vehicle after they bid and won at auction. At this time, The Autopian has been unable to contact the affected buyers, but we would dearly love to hear their side of the story. Please reach out to tips@theautopian.com if you have any information in this regard.
Ultimately, this story tells us one thing—don’t trust everything you read on an online sale site, and don’t get too excited if you win your auction. The car’s not yours until it’s in the driveway and the title has cleared. There’s some questionable stuff going on out there, and you can’t always trust the platforms to catch it. Platforms also push hard for no reserve auctions, as this is meant to ensure vehicles always sell. However, it often leads to upset sellers, or upset buyers if the sellers welch on the deal. It’s not hard to find examples on Reddit of misery on both sides—sellers and buyers.
Regardless of what Alex may have agreed to when signing up to a no-reserve auction on Bring a Trailer, he remains steadfast about his choice not to honor the deal. In a statement, he indicated he was unrepentant for his actions.
I get it. You are making an article to bash my business for not following through with an auction. Trying to get sensationalism by spewing negativity, journalism like this is the problem with the world today. But anyways as i have shown you with the reddit links, its not uncommon for a seller to refuse to sell an item when the item sells at auction for way below its value. Put yourself in this situation, i dont know what vehicle you own, but if auction ended for $10,000 less than its worth, would you sell the item when you already have a buyer lined up to pay its actual value? But nevertheless, i welcome your bad publicity trying to make me look bad, any publicity is good publicity.
In his final communication, Alex included a YouTube video for us to indicate his position.
Oh, and despite everything? Nobody, and I mean nobody, would tell us what happened to the Suzuki Every van. That’s the way it goes.
Thanks to Mercedes Streeter, Matt Hardigree, and David Tracy for their assistance on this piece.
Image credits: Bring a Trailer, Street Legal Mini Trucks and Japstar Imports via screenshot
Everybody comes out bad in this story. A used car dealer coming out as shady isn’t that surprising but BaT really needs to clean up their platform.
Alex sounds like a major dickhead here. So he only addresses questions that he feels are worthy of his time, eh? Douche.’
BAT don’t sound a whole lot better at this point either.
Interesting shit show to be sure.
As shady as this guy is (and that’s putting it very kindly), he sure talked with you guys way more than many other sketchy dealerships would. He shared more than BaT did.
Honestly, if I worked at a dealership and something like this came up, I’d be keeping my mouth shut and letting an attorney do any talking, even if the dealership wasn’t in the wrong.
This highlights the main problem I have with vehicle auctions: at the end of the day, unless the auction house sets up a consignment contract with the seller (and BaT usually doesn’t), there’s not a lot they can do if a title-holding seller refuses to honor an auction result. Other than keeping any selling fees and banning users, without holding the titles in escrow and having a binding sale contract, what more can they do?
BaT could inform potential buyers by listing in prominent text on every auction the “seller” has or lists for the next 5 years the number of auctions they failed to follow through on.
Or just ban the seller the first time. Why let hang around for repeat offenses?
That is Cars and Bid’s policy, if you as a seller do not follow through with a No Reserve Auction sale, you get banned, period. C&B does cancel auctions when a car has an issue during the auction or a miscommunication happens, and they state it directly, but if a Seller acts in bad faith, they get the boot.
Claiming to not be committing fraud will not actually protect you when you are.
If they are involved in interstate commerce . . .
I realize that. I’m not defending the Alex guy, just surprised he talked to Autopian at all.
See…..I have real issues with Bring A Trailer….
They started when I attempted to sell a HONEY of an OBS Chevy Pickup….but was basically told to get fucked because never mind the fact that is truly was immaculate, it had 130,000 miles. Now mind you, it was 22 year old truck, beg’n your pardon for not having one that new in the wrapper fresh, but it was very lovingly cared for and actually driven….
Then I started seeing cars popping up with rust, 200,000 miles, “projects”, and other shit that I would expect to find perusing my local Craigslist.
Then, I started looking for cars myself there. Something interesting, odd, different, quirky like me…..and the same thing would happen that happened with the two cars in the article. I would put these cars on my watchlist, they would be no reserve, and the seller wouldn’t turn loose of the car. This happens more than you may think, and I guess I’m just good at picking them…..because I’m poor.
Which leads into this article well. The common denominator here is that cars that sell for little money are the ones that people get bent on, because Bring a Trailer has a reputation of bringing the money. This creates a race to the bottom for the budget shopper – unscrupulous, greedy sellers, and a platform that pretty much doesn’t want anything to do with the plebes.
Here’s what I personally expect of Bring a Trailer – well-vetted cars and sellers. If your shit’s not worth having in the auction, bounce it. If you have an asshole seller, bounce them.
Nowadays, it’s a high stakes game rigged to be more like a Vegas poker table – your ass is probably gonna lose.
This Alex person reminds me of a short term girlfriend of who tried to convince me everything shitty she did was actually my fault.
Alex sounds like a shady character who gives dealers a bad name.
I wouldn’t go that far.
This Alex guy is the kind of low life dirtbag used car salesman that gives lowlife dirtbag used car salesmen a bad name. On the other hand BAT is an entire gang of lowlife dirtbag salesmen who managed to incorporate under those principles. F*ck them both.
Thanks for covering this. I’ve had dealings with this guy a couple times, and he’s always been super shady. He will insult you if you ask questions about his cars or ask for more than the 5 pictures on the site. He’s also well known for importing illegal cars which is probably what happened with the one guy who said he couldn’t get his car titled. I’ve literally never heard of a single good experience with this guy, and his aggressive and dismissive interactions with y’all show nothing has changed.
I saw those two 2011s in his screenshots up there and was wondering how hes gonna sell those…
I will never understand how shops like this are allowed to keep operating. Dude should’ve been shut down many years ago
Very interesting, yeah. They’re being sold for “off road use” but it was my understanding that they usually aren’t even allowed to cross the border.
Those 2011s are legal if they were imported for off-road use only and have 25 mph speed limiters. You can even import a brand new Kei truck if it’s restricted like that.
Hey Brandon,
Really sorry to hear that. If you want to share the story, I’d love to hear it — hit me up at lewin@TheAutopian.com
Honestly not a whole lot to my story but I’ll try to put it together tomorrow
Hey! Glad to see you on here 🙂
sorry this shit happened to you tho 🙁
I didn’t buy anything from him, I tried to and he was a dick who refused to answer basic questions so that was enough of a red flag for me. I have just heard lots of horror stories from others.
This could be avoided if they were enforcing to sellers to have a hold in their credit card with BAT for $1000 (just an example) refundable if the transaction is complete. I don’t know the specific terms and conditions but this is a good way to avoid the drama and your business reputation.
I have a feeling this Alex guys imports cars that may or may not have been stolen. There was another shady dealer that was selling “legally imported” JDM cars in VA that were most likely stolen in Japan.
Yep. I’ve heard that from this snake a few times. Stolen cars and parts.
Im not a fan of BaT. I despise dealerships that purposefully leave cars on websites after they’ve sold (especially when they don’t mark it as such). Im going with they were both in the wrong.
lol, I hadn’t realized how much I hate someone justifying their actions by saying ‘it’s not illegal’ until I read this. I may have missed things, but it felt like seller took a deposit for a car from someone, then proceeded to list that car on auction to see if he could beat it (without listing a reserve)? I’m not sure what the intention of a deposit if it’s not to hold the car at agreed terms. I guess it’s not illegal!
Btw, props to Lewis for posting positive reviews alongside negative ones. Even if I don’t like the seller, still fair to do it.
I have bought and sold on BaT several times over the last two years. I also follow the reddit thread. There are a lot of people these days posting on Reddit having issues with either a seller not following through on a no-reserve auction or a buyer basically never showing up at the close of the auction. It screws everyone involved. (Caramel as BaT’s escrow service of choice is another HOT topic that should be reviewed).
Now, onto the topic of this article. I think this “dealer” or whatever the fuck he is – well he’s a real piece of work and is shady as hell. I would never buy from him. But I’ll give him one thing. BaT takes literally FOREVER to list cars, especially ones that are popular and common. I got jerked around as a private seller for almost three months trying to get my car listed. They give dealers priority. Granted, it was a popular car and BaT doesn’t want too many of the same car on the market at the same time to devalue everyone’s sale, but they promised me multiple timelines that came and went with no communication.
First my car was going live in a couple weeks. Then it was “next week”. Then another week. Then two weeks went by. I had to communicate with them every time – had no one reach out to me to confirm timing. It really hosed me because I had too many cars to have at my house and I had planned (what I felt) was ample time between buying one car and selling another – like two months. I finally had enough and told them I was pulling my car from the site if they couldn’t give me a hard date when the car would go live (they have to have a calendar for these things if they are coordinating their “live date” right??), and magically the car went live in a day.
I think BaT is in over their heads in a lot of ways. They need to do a better job communicating with the sellers and also weeding out the sketch balls.
Ever since BaT was bought, their volume got pumped to an extreme amount, the quality of cars (and random car-adjacent crap) has plummeted, and they clearly shove everyone around to make as many auctions as possible No-Reserve to guarantee they get paid out, despite still charging to list in the first place. It’s clear Hearst is cashing in on the previously excellent image of BaT for the sake of profits, and because of the volume they do, assume they can weather some bad experiences.
Also, what are the gripes about Caramel? I know nothing about the company so I’m very intrigued by this being a hot topic.
Definitely a juicy topic. Read up on the bring a trailer reddit thread. Basically it’s because Caramel is packaged like it’s part of BaT but then it comes time to do the paperwork and they are very very difficult to contact outside of a one-line email and frequently eff up paperwork.
Alex seems like a delightful chap.
May his socks always be wet, and I hope he steps on a LEGO piece every morning when he gets out of bed.
And may he find fiberglass in his cocaine.
Awesome detective work! It’s awfully shady that Alex put the vehicles up for a no-reserve auction, then refused to honor the winning bids, saying they had been “pre-sold”. He brings new meaning to the word stealership.
I think the dealer already had an offer pending, maybe even more than one, and was waiting to see if the BaT auction will fetch an even higher number.
Since it did not, they decided not to honor the no-reserve auction.
Kind of a greedy thing to do and should result in a ban from that site, but dealers gonna deal..
To be honest I’d rather follow Mercedes’ articles here and import my own Kei.
Wow seems two greedy car sales agencies decided lie for money. The dealership probably got it and didn’t want to title it so they could lie about owning it. And BAT which has gone down hill like the guy in the Doritos commercial decided screw the rules and clammed up probably by the lawyers advice. The buyer dodged a bullet. It seems to me most times a seller will mention selling on various sites. Does BAT require follow through and not selling elsewhere? If not it is ultimately on BAT.
Seller’s in his right not to sell if someone’s lowball opening bid wins, platform’s in their rights to ban sellers for doing it.
Both should reexamine their resistance to just setting a reserve, or a sufficient opening bid, in the first place.
If the seller takes the risk of listing without a reserve, they accept the outcome. Plain and simple.
A friend tried to list a cherry Triumph TR6 a year ago, and wanted a reserve of $18k, which seemed to be about average on for sale sites, but would be low for this truly pristine example (everything except for the horn worked) that had the “right” features/options… BaT insisted he list without a reserve or they wouldn’t take the listing.
He passed – sold it on classic trader or something else for $25 or $26k…
On this anecdote, BaT wouldn’t allow a reserve to be set. (at least my friend had the smarts to seek another solution.)
IMHO this is the way it should work. It’s shitty that BaT seems to be allergic to letting sellers set a reserve, but if the sellers wants a reserve and BaT won’t accept it they need to go somewhere else, not refuse to honor the auction when it closes below their non-existent reserve.
The “might” is the key element in Alex’s statement. He never said he wanted the auction canceled before it went live. Once it did go live, and Alex asked about the possibility of removing it BAT made it clear that Alex was expected to sell it to the winning bidder. That any potential buyer would need to bid on the truck with BAT.
Alex is full of crap and wanted to see if he could get more than the $18k by putting it on BAT. He set it up so he could take whichever number was higher. Hopefully, he gets everything he deserves out of his life.
Alex seems like someone to avoid. BaT possibly as well.
I miss the olde BaT when it was just that – weird old car listings found on line etc. Oh well.
Those were the days.
barnfinds.com has a few auctions, but mostly it’s just links.
Love that you guys presented everything as-is without bias and let Alex hang himself with his own rope. Or sour grapevine, as it may be. But as we keep hearing, journalism like this is the problem with the world today.
Yeah, BaT did some things wrong here, but ultimately Alex should start a new career as Iraqi Minister of Information. Or CEO of Astronomer.
No both are good to avoid both did the dance and got burned
Trump will pardon his crimes (you just know he has something on his record) and appoint him the head of the CFPB.
GTFOH with the non-sequitur political comments.
Lots of shady to go around here. But at the end of the day, with all of these online car auctions right up to and including granddaddy eBay, the seller is actually under zero obligation to actually sell the thing if they don’t like the final price. All that can really be done is keeping the listing fee and banning them from the site. And to be honest, in a case like this, I do not blame the guy for not taking a $10K+ hit, even if the truck had not sold already. BaT certainly should have taken the auction down and pocketed whatever fees the seller paid, so they are hardly on the side of the angels here either. Though IIRC, buyers pay a LOT more on that site than sellers do, so they have every incentive not to do so. And I can see that if it takes more than a day or two for an auction to go live, that things like this are going to happen occasionally.
Personally, I don’t see why someone being a dealer or not a dealer makes a hill of beans difference. I only care about two things when buying a car – the car, and the price. Who is selling it matters not in the slightest (at least assuming they are legally entitled to sell it – I try not to buy stolen goods).
I feel a little bit for the two buyers who thought they were about to get screaming deals, but you know what they say about “too good to be true”…
“Personally, I don’t see why someone being a dealer or not a dealer makes a hill of beans difference.”
Depends on state laws. In some states, dealers have more liability, they may be subject to more laws, if fraud is found they could lose their dealer license, etc.
In theory (and depending on state law) buying from a dealer *should* be less of a crapshoot than buying from a private party.
IF the seller is a dealer and misrepresenting himself as a private party, it *MAY* be to sidestep some of the liability.
Additional thought: In many states (maybe most?) a private party selling a vehicle without a title in their name is considered a “curbstoner” and that’s illegal.
I think it’s all states. It’s a felony in most of them too.
Sounds like yet another illegal law written to protect a business, yet another form of fraud.
Protectionism I think they call it.
Yup. For starters, dealers can lose their licenses if they are caught playing games with the titles, like Alex seems to like to do.
To me, a dealer, even selling on consignment, should not be listed as a “private party” sale.
Bring a Trailer wouldn’t specify these things if it didn’t matter to people. It’s about trust and knowing who you’re dealing with.
I definitely get that it’s not a big deal to everyone, for sure. But I think the insistence by the dealer that it was listed as “Private Party” raised many a red flag, along with everything else.
100% seems like a dealer listing a car as a “private party” sale is the reddest of the red flags here. Almost like they are trying to dodge something. Title reassignment is only allowed for dealers and that’s how they don’t have to pay sales tax on these cars. Why would someone deliberately (And essentially) title skip a car as a private sale when they are a dealer?
I don’t care if it matters to you, it doesn’t matter to me. And it really shouldn’t matter at all. As I said, only two things really matter – the car and the price. I really could not care less who is selling the thing, as long as they are legally able to sell it.
I have a good friend who has sold several cars for me over the years. He has the time to deal with it, and he’s rather better at it than I am. I give him a percentage of the final price, which incentivizes him to get the most for the car as possible. Works out great for both of us, as I tend to all but give away cars when I am done with them, and I don’t have the time or patience to deal with the great unwashed. Would this raise “many red flags”?
Dealers selling on BaT are required to disclose whether or not they are dealers. A dealer can very easily try and be unscrupulous by stating that they’re a private party, and there’s only so much that BaT can do. At the end of the day, they’re not able to personally inspect and vet every single seller and vehicle – the very nature of an online auction carries with it some risk, and you do, at some point, just need to trust and hope that people are telling the truth.
It does matter whether something is being sold by a dealer or not – to some people, that may be more or less appealing, so the seller has a duty to any interested party to be truthful. If they’re a reputable dealer, they should have no issue whatsoever in telling people they’re a dealer. The red flags come in when they’re trying to hide that info for whatever reason.
A dealership and the person who owns a dealership (or works for a dealership) are separate legal entities. Either can sell a car anyway they want.
That’s true, but if the owner of a dealership says he’s a private seller and processes the sale through his dealership, then that’s a dealer sale.
Agree if that was the case. But he didn’t process the auction sale through the dealership – because it didn’t sell via the auction. Online sleuths have figured out that he is associated with a dealership.
Now the dealership may have actually sold the car to the actual buyer – but that has nothing to do with the auction. We have no idea what he would have done if he had accepted the auction result and sold the car to the high bidder.
The whole thing is unethical and sketchy, but that’s life.
You understand the meaning of a no-reserve auction, right? If you don’t want to sell below a certain price, then you put in a reserve price.
That’s probably the biggest head scratcher of the article for me – I get BaT wants auctions without reserves. But if I’m a seller, I don’t give a flying @(*$ what BaT wants. There’s no (proverbial) gun to anyone’s head here.
What this seller did lacks integrity, pure and simple.
Exactly. It was a dick move, but people are dicks all the time. Move on, buy something else. This guy should be banned from BaT, but probably won’t be because they make too much money listing this sort of thing, and it’s really no skin off their nose. Or he will just list cars under a different account.
Not the point. Yes, that is the theory of a reserve auction vs. non-reserve. But at the end of the day, either way, the seller is under no legal obligation to go through with the sale. They could just as easily set a reserve, have the reserve met, get a better offer locally, or just change their mind and decide not to sell the thing after all.
In the vast majority of cases, there is NO legal contract between an auction seller and an auction bidder. Moral contracts are worth the paper they are printed on.
If this was an auction run by the proper auction houses, there would be no backing out because the seller doesn’t like the price.
You have two choices as a seller- one, set a reserve price, and two, pull the auction before the hammer falls.
I want to note that at no point did we accuse anyone of breaking the law. Alex is correct that it’s not illegal to not honor an auction result, but that wasn’t something we even brought up.
At any rate, I wonder how the truck’s buyer feels knowing that the people on BAT think it’s worth only half as much as they paid.
If you’re reading this, contact us!
How could it possibly be legal?
Whether govt is interested in prosecuting any criminals is a completely different question.
The act of not finishing a BAT auction is not a crime. Any cause of action in this case would be civil and I’m not sure what someone would even sue for.
The buyer will have their bidding hold released back to them, so they have lost nothing but hurt feelings and whatever time it took to punch in bids.
For the seller, it’s a breach of whatever contract or terms of conditions they have with Bring a Trailer, and the platform normally enforces them by banning the seller.
Now, the weird title situation and a dealer trying to sell a car as a private party could upset the authorities, but that’s a whole other can of worms.
Actions can be civil and criminal both.
Deception for profit is a criminal act.
Intent matters, but a dealer with a pattern would have a hard time explaining.
A local car dealer was caught by the feds money laundering for others through car purchases.
Turns out that’s much more serious than what everyone knew about him.
Re titles and the DMV, shifty actions by the state DMV seems to be driven by the same group interfering with kei cars nationally.
All sorts of odd actions.
Some car media have covered this.
They tried to demand cash from a friend for a car purchase that was under valued, only it wasn’t.
Also, he scrapped it years ago when the $8000 cvt transmission went to automotive valhalla.
Right. In that case, it’s not the auction result itself that’s illegal, but why the dealer did it. You are correct, intent matters!
Problem is, few prosecutors are going to waste their time going through failed no reserve auctions to see if the seller is up to no good. Especially since the wronged party on the auction platform should be made whole by the platform. That’s why this problem is so rampant on the selling platforms. The risk is minimal.
Gary Duncan, one of the biggest names in the American JDM biz, was caught with his pants down placing fake bids in his own auctions to boost his payout. He then openly admitted it. What happened to him? Nothing. It’s aggravating, for sure.
The “Dealer” didn’t do anything. A person who happens to be associated with a car dealership did something. And it doesn’t matter if he is the principal owner of an employee. BIG difference.
The only legal issue I see here is if the guy personally tried to sell more cars than his state allows without a dealer license. But the fact that *technically* he doesn’t own the car probably covers him there at least somewhat (it would in my state, I don’t presume to know what the laws are for that in NJ). You aren’t buying the car from him, he is just the listing agent, and unlike in real estate, listing agents for cars is not a regulated thing as far as I know.
Shilling can be prevented.
I mostly quit using eBay when they allowed concealed shilling.
I caught numerous people doing it.
A “dealership” is a separate legal entity, NOT a person (even though the Supremes seem Hell-bent on making Corporations people). There is no reason why someone who happens to own that legal entity or be associated with it should be prohibited from selling a car *personally*. I am assuming that the “dealership” never took this car into inventory. This guy may very well just be selling the thing for a friend – I have a friend who has sold a number of cars for me.
I very much agree that this is a rather immoral and unethical situation, but it’s unlikely to be in any way illegal.
There is no contract between lister and bidder in the vast majority of auctions. And even if there was, breaking a contract is nearly never “illegal”, aka subject to criminal sanctions (exceptions being highly regulated industries like securities). It might open you to civil liabilities, but law suits are VERY expensive, and nobody is going to sue anybody over not being able to buy a $20K used car. Nobody was harmed here, just disappointed.
The first mistake was trying to do business with anyone or any entity in New Jersey.
Dude, you are so right. I just called out a dealer in Jersey on BaT selling an absolutely filthy Cayenne – and having the gall to charge a dealer fee. The interior looks like it hasn’t been vacuumed in a couple years. Their response was “we don’t detail the car until after it has sold”….OK, right…
That actually isn’t all that unusual. Especially for cars where it’s a tossup as to whether they are going to retail or wholesale the thing. It costs them money to detail a car, so if it’s possibly just going to go to auction some won’t bother.
But it shouldn’t stop you from buying a diamond in the rough, just as a beautifully presented and photographed car can be an absolute polished turd.
Born and raised in NJ…still doing ok 50 years later…..
Can you tell us where NJ touched you? LOL
I only bought gas in NJ once, and that was under duress because I wasn’t gonna make it over the state line on the turnpike. Otherwise I fill all the way up in Easton PA or West Nyack and hold my breath the entire time.
Jersey here also. Yes we have a bit of a reputation but it’s unfair to paint us with such a broad brush based on one or a few bad experiences.
PS It’s not all smokestacks and oil refineries here – South Jersey is completely different!
Rich Benoit has an opinion on the last Tesla he bought. Haha
Can concur. I have bought two cars from a sketchy used car operation in NJ that has two locations. Right cars at high but acceptable enough prices, but SUPER sketchy operation. They specialize in the sort of “interesting things” that you won’t find elsewhere, so you put up with the sketch if you want the car. For example, right now they have an ’85 Peugeot TurboDiesel wagon in great shape – probably the only one that will be for sale in the country for YEARS. If you want that car, you are going to be buying it from them, sketchy or no sketchy. But I sure wouldn’t deal with them for a used Camry.
Thankfully, building my new house has me destitute or I would probably be on an airplane to NJ. And that I still look at their website regularly is a sign of the mental illness that is car nuttiness.
I also bought a car from the Russian mob out of the back of a Lincoln dealership in PA right across the NJ border. Close enough.
Russian businessmen, eh?
I walked into a record distribution office in the south once.
Just happened to be run by two young Italian guys with New York accents, that seemed startled and disturbed to see anyone.