I thought I'd share a funny story about a car saleman I dealt with one time. About 4 years ago I was interested in a 1993 Mercedes 300E that had about 150,000 miles on it. It was for sale at one of those tiny little dealerships that only consisted of the owner, a secretary, and one salesman.

I told the owner that I was interested in the vehicle and asked him if I could have a pre-purchase inspection performed at the authorized MB dealer. Much to my surprise, he agreed. So I'm sitting in the MB dealer and about an hour later the inspection is finished and the service consultant walks up to me with a BIG list of things that were wrong with the car. The car needed nearly $3,000 of work. The head gasket was blown (the tech at the MB dealer said it was obvious that the seller tried to cover it up by wiping off all the oil), the emergency brake didn't work, etc., etc., etc...

So I drive the car back to the little two-bit car dealer, show him the list, and tell him it needs almost $3,000 of work. Obviously the guy looked absolutely shocked like he had no idea that anything was wrong with the car. So he calls up the MB dealer I took the car to and asked for the prices of the parts that would be needed to fix it. He gets off the phone and says, "Those prices they quoted you are the retail prices! I tell you what. If you buy this car I'll fix everything on this list for $100." He then says, "As far as the emergency brake goes, do you ever use it? I don't know about you, but I just put my car in park. I never use the emergency brake." I said I'd have to think about it, walked out, and never went back.

Now that I look back at the situation it makes me smile. Isn't it illegal to sell a car without a functioning emergency brake? On the check list in the window it listed that the brake was functional, so that was obviously a lie.

Of course the prices the MB dealer quoted were retail! Why wouldn't they be? If I had bought the car I would have had the repairs done by the dealer anyway. Who in their right mind would have trusted this guy to perform the repairs? Even if he had attempted to do them, which I'm sure he wouldn't have, he probably couldn't have done the head gasket job correctly.

All I can say is that I'm SO glad that I paid the $100 to have the inspection done at the MB dealer. In the end it saved me a lot of money. Crooked salesmen...I tell you.

Does anyone else have a funny story you'd like to tell about a salesman trying to rip you off? It's amazing some of the BS these guys try to sell you.