Author Topic: Accepting checks for car sale: prevent bounced check??  (Read 17436 times)

kamas

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Accepting checks for car sale: prevent bounced check??
« on: June 15, 2017, 12:42:08 PM »
If you are selling your old car, what form of payment do you accept? cash or check? If you receive a check, then do you give the buyer the car title right away? How do you know the check is real and will not bounce? If it bounced, then you just gave your car away for free!

What do you do in a case if the buyer wants to pay with a check?

Midwest

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Re: Accepting checks for car sale: prevent bounced check??
« Reply #1 on: June 15, 2017, 12:43:41 PM »
If you are selling your old car, what form of payment do you accept? cash or check? If you receive a check, then do you give the buyer the car title right away? How do you know the check is real and will not bounce? If it bounced, then you just gave your car away for free!

What do you do in a case if the buyer wants to pay with a check?

Go to their bank and/or take cash.

Scortius

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Re: Accepting checks for car sale: prevent bounced check??
« Reply #2 on: June 15, 2017, 01:04:20 PM »
You just can't.  I guess the only caveat is if they were willing to give you the check and wait for it to clear before receiving the title and keys.  Even then I would be skeptical.  What's so hard about going to their bank to get cash?  If they're spending the time to buy a car, they should be willing to make one more quick trip.

As someone said.  Go to the bank together, do the trade in the lobby, then turn around and take the cash back to the teller and exchange it for a cashier's check (or pay for a money order) to deposit in your own bank.

galliver

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Re: Accepting checks for car sale: prevent bounced check??
« Reply #3 on: June 15, 2017, 01:35:42 PM »
...or just use the cashier's check or money orders to begin with?

Midwest

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Re: Accepting checks for car sale: prevent bounced check??
« Reply #4 on: June 15, 2017, 01:38:16 PM »
...or just use the cashier's check or money orders to begin with?

If you get those at your bank while I watch that would work too.  If a stranger brought me a cashiers check for a car, I would be reluctant to take it for fear of it being fake.

ysette9

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Re: Accepting checks for car sale: prevent bounced check??
« Reply #5 on: June 15, 2017, 02:11:23 PM »
I bought a car from an old guy who didn't trust the cashier's check. I called my credit union, explained that concerns and put the teller on the phone with the seller to explain what was going on and the fact that I definitely had the money to cover the sale.

My husband has sold a car where he accepted a check and just didn't send the title until after it had cashed.

nouveauRiche

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Re: Accepting checks for car sale: prevent bounced check??
« Reply #6 on: June 15, 2017, 02:14:49 PM »
...or just use the cashier's check or money orders to begin with?

When I recently sold a car on Craigslist, the web site warned me about the possibility of a fake cashier's check.

If you get an email about your ad that says the "person" wants to buy your "item" for the "price in the advert" and offers to send you a cashier's check - it's a scam.  FYI.


retiringearly

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Re: Accepting checks for car sale: prevent bounced check??
« Reply #7 on: June 15, 2017, 02:18:03 PM »
I would require to meet the buyer at his bank and receive cash.  I sold a 13 year old car and did it that way.  Easy for both of us.

Cassie

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Re: Accepting checks for car sale: prevent bounced check??
« Reply #8 on: June 15, 2017, 04:27:00 PM »
We only accept cash when selling our old cars.

FINate

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Re: Accepting checks for car sale: prevent bounced check??
« Reply #9 on: June 15, 2017, 04:42:38 PM »
The only way I would take a cashier's check:
1) Meet in parking lot of their bank.
2) Check their photo ID. Walk away if they don't have one, won't let you look at it, or anything is fishy.
3) Take photo of their ID with your phone. Let the other person do the same if they want.
4) Negotiate an unpredictable price that is slightly less than advertised. E.g. if the car was listed for $10k, make it $9997 on the spot. The main thing is this has to be a value the person could not have anticipated to prevent them from fabricating a fake check in advance.
5) Go with them into the bank as they get the cashier's check.
6) Check agreed upon amount on check and date.
7) Verify the check by calling the bank before sighing over the pink slip.
8) Deposit ASAP.

Hotstreak

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Re: Accepting checks for car sale: prevent bounced check??
« Reply #10 on: June 15, 2017, 04:53:51 PM »
Fake cashiers checks are easy to pass to people who aren't dealing with them on a regular basis. You can buy check stock online for cheap and print very official looking checks from home... even someone trained to spot fake checks is not immune. Personal checks are worse and not worth accepting from someone you don't trust. Even if the check "clears" the next day, the funds can be taken back several days later for a variety of reasons.


Cash is King, but even then you can be accepting forgeries (and again, if you're not trained to spot them, you're out of luck) or meet them at their bank and stand next to them as the teller makes out the cashiers check.

wanderin1

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Re: Accepting checks for car sale: prevent bounced check??
« Reply #11 on: June 15, 2017, 05:37:09 PM »
Another issue to consider: make sure the buyer transfers of the title into THEIR name. In the couple of states I’ve lived in, you can sign the title over to a buyer, but unless they complete the process, the title is still registered in your name. That means if the car gets parking tickets or is involved in other trouble, in theory, you’d still be on the hook (In reality, it just turns into a long slog of stressful paperwork).

I’ve sold several cars. Each time, I’ve only accepted cash. Usually, that’s meant a trip with the buyer to their bank to get the cash (hovering close enough to be sure they are going to give me money they just got from the teller). From there, it’s a trip with the buyer directly to the vehicle licensing office (in my state, a commercial office authorized by the St department of licensing to provide services—fast, efficient, open all kinds of hours). The buyer can then see that I actually am the registered owner of the vehicle and that the title is clear) The buyer then hands me the money right there, I sign the title over, and stand by while they register the title in their own name.

Yes, the process takes a bit of time. But it assures both parties that everything has been done right. I’ve wound up selling to conscientious people who were very happy with this process.


johnny847

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Re: Accepting checks for car sale: prevent bounced check??
« Reply #12 on: June 15, 2017, 06:32:48 PM »
My husband has sold a car where he accepted a check and just didn't send the title until after it had cashed.

Hotstreak noted the problem with this
Even if the check "clears" the next day, the funds can be taken back several days later for a variety of reasons.

But I want to emphasize this point again. Just because the funds became available in your bank account DOES NOT mean that the check is actually good.
Banks often make money available before they get the funds, and warn you of this. That is perfectly legal.
...
These are the rules for fund availability. http://www.federalreserve.gov/boarddocs/supmanual/cch/efaa.pdf
However, making funds available doesn't mean that the check cleared.
...
Actually, by law the bank must make deposited funds available to the depositor within a day or two, BUT that doesn't mean that the bank can't later determine that the deposited funds were no good, and then reverse the deposit (and charge the depositor a "bounced check" fee for the bad deposit, and any "bounced check" or overdraft fees for any bad checks that that the depositor wrote or if the depositor's account went negative).
>>How do you know when the funds are actually received and the transaction can't be reversed?
>>>>You generally can't.

Or if you want a source that isn't reddit...
The most important thing to know is that a check can bounce after you deposit it – even if your bank allows you to withdraw cash from that deposit.

obstinate

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Re: Accepting checks for car sale: prevent bounced check??
« Reply #13 on: June 15, 2017, 10:28:33 PM »
...or just use the cashier's check or money orders to begin with?

If you get those at your bank while I watch that would work too.  If a stranger brought me a cashiers check for a car, I would be reluctant to take it for fear of it being fake.
You can call the bank and verify that the cashier's check is backed by money. I recently sold a car and used the verification service. Look up the number independently -- don't use the number on the check. Tell the bank representative the info on the check. They will tell you if the check is good.

I loved the way my guy said it. "Yes, that check is valid. Good as cash."

obstinate

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Re: Accepting checks for car sale: prevent bounced check??
« Reply #14 on: June 15, 2017, 10:30:05 PM »
Another issue to consider: make sure the buyer transfers of the title into THEIR name.
No, you need to do a "release of liability." This is independent of the buyer registering the car and independent of transferring the title. Look up the process for doing that in your state on Google.

 

Wow, a phone plan for fifteen bucks!