Forest your deal is similar to mine. I was burned by a reputable dealer out of Texas. I bought my first Newell off ebay and wish I would have backed out and bought another one instead for three times the price in California, I blew the amount of difference anyway.
The dealer gave me a song and dance over the phone, he asked me during our phone conversations what I thought it was going to bring on the ebay auction and I gave my opinion like an idiot. This dealer ate me up and spit me out.
After doing a little research, I believe it was a shill. To make a long story short, I won the auction, sent my deposit and waited for the call to pick it up. He talked me into waiting on picking it up so they could give it the once over, change the fluids, seal the roof etc. That got strung out for two weeks. He also offered to take a Harley in trade I going to sell anyway, which made it seem like a better deal.
After hauling the Harley down to Texas from California with my cashier’s check in hand, upon arrival I was greeted very graciously and got a tour of the old girl and it was love at first site, in fact after looking prior at so many bus conversions and unfinished projects this classic was so cool and thinking it was a third of the newer one out in Cali.
It was so cool and impressive that I got overtaken by many issues I later had to address during future ownership. They had thrown some boards in the basement from when someone had done the upgrade to the bedroom to only cover the rotten basement floor area. They made the wall damage sound like it was not as big as it was. Anyway you should get the picture.
Hey, they were so nice to take my wife down to JC Penny's to get new bedding, throw in a new water pump. I thought to myself these guys are pretty nice. I just had some good Texas smoke blown up you know where. I don't trust 98% of dealers selling anything that has wheels under it. Even with Carfax, it hasn't changed; they just use that one to their own favor. I have family that has owned over 30 New and used car dealerships and decided a while ago, I wanted no more part of it.
Now a point here even if you can do the work yourself is to inspect, inspect and inspect before making a large purchase. Sometimes we takes gambles knowing we may or may not be getting in over our heads and that may be a different situation, knowing we are getting a killer deal and will have some real work to do. It's ok to save money by doing sweat equity, I've done it on a few properties and vehicles etc., but it is much better knowing that it was your choice in the matter and not because you just got ripped off.