Beware of 95 F355 Red on Black Miami

Hello, A PSA here, I have been looking for a red on tan manual GTB or GTS F355 as is so common, or a short list of other cars.

I am keen to do a dealer transaction out of laziness to sell my A+ drivers quality 03 Lotus Esprit so a trade is ideal even if I take a little haircut otherwise my F355 purchase is delayed until I have the bandwidth to sell it and i had slowed my search.

Then a 95 red on black GTB manual popped up at a dealer local to me and I was ready to go, its this car:

https://www.realmusclecar.com/listings/1995-ferrari-f355-gtb-berlinetta-1-owner-22k-miles/

I pursued a framework of what I'd pay for it and what they'd give me for the Lotus on trade, it went ok over the phone but they insisted on what I thought was a decent to strong price on the F355 and a pretty low trade on Lotus, insisted so I said ok if the cars in great shape and all checks out not going to lose it over a few k.

Went down to see it this week and brought my car so ready to trade, title to my car ready to go, check for the difference in hand. The F355 wasn't nearly as nice as I hoped, paint issue on every panel, torn ebrake boot, sticky buttons, suspension light on, leather on the inside pulling in ALL common places and most alarmingly 4 different tires(a Bridgestone, a Pirelli, a Hankook and a WESTLAKE, what type of owner of a car like this does this) and it put the idea its a one owner car, paint issues into a different light. The car drove great around the block, but I feared I was buying too many paint issues, too many interior issues to ever have a really nice car, and the paint issues made me concerned that one huge positive a cleancarfax and one owner for 90% of its life meant something different, that the owner may have crashed it and paid out of pocket to fix. Engine bay did look clean, but drivers door looked to have sloppy respray, passenger side separately had the paint polished off of it down to primer in places.

Young guys at the place were fine to talk to, older owner was pushy, rude, aggressive in BS comments about my car when i pointed out the undisclosed issues on theirs, told me F355's are bullet proof engines, never anything that goes, just talking out his rear, telling me someones flying in to buy it so buy it or don't and went home for the day before i left. I walked away saying the verbal price we agreed to isn't acceptable at this condition and they proceeded to call me until 10pm to make a deal, next morning we came to price i said deal pending PPI.

They had pressed me to do PPI at their shop but i just dismissed it until this point, now I said, we have a deal its goint to Ferrari of Ft Lauderdale or Tim Stanford for PPI, comes out ok we're good to go.

It was fishy and alarming to here but worth pursuing for a local car, they outright said no to a PPI anywhere but their shop despite that i was paying for PPI and openly stated i'd flatbed it to the PPI.

They said they'd call back and never did, this is my last text to them, no answer:

"I feel an obligation to say, I find it very alarming that where I have a ppi done at my expense is an issue for you all as the seller, especially when I say I will pay for it to be flatbedded so there is absolutely zero downside to you all, no cost, no miles, transported via insured tow truck to a ppi is me handling all the hassles of the transaction.

It’s not only an issue, I’m being told it’s worth making or not making a deal over.

There’s simply no reasonable explanation for it that I can think of, I’d love to be wrong but I can’t come up with anything."

No answer, car is not how they represent it clearly both in person and the PPI will show it, there is no other conclusion so save your time and don't look at this car.

 

I felt the obligation to post here, thank you guys.

I am local so little harm. I've bought many a fine car, motorcycle, watch without seeing them in person and it would be terrible if someone did so on this car; and I could see it happening due the place being loaded with rare porsches and nice RUF's spurring confidence but it would be ill placed. They're very pushy so i could see someone flying out to see it and getting steamrolled into a bad deal.

Deal was my 23k mile 03 Esprit, an essentially perfect, strong running drivers car with some rock chips and a few dings in the suicidal front splitter which most simply take off. That car plus $35k was the deal verbally which I think a great deal would've been my car plus $30k trade, far deal my car plus $32,500. My car plus $30k and easy no bank transaction locally was barely pallatable for me and great for them in my opinion. I put my car at a $48-$50k private sale, local Lotus offered me $43,500 a month ago.

Final deal was my car plus $32k and that was agreed to, until I insisted on my choice of PPI which scuttled not only the deal but they went silent.

I wouldn't buy their car for $60k at this point.

 

BAT is a great suggestion, I have a bit too much going on at the moment and need to regroup on it, thats probably the right way to go

 

100%! Thats what I was saying to them but they were scummy and pushy, my position was they are local and if all checked out at PPI and ok deal, bought the Lotus sight unseen from Montreal but from a quality private seller, what a difference. Here I was very very uncomfortable but saying, if all is good at PPI and i mean thorough PPI beyond engine and compression, go in searching for problems then local balanced the ******** i was dealing with.

They made it crystal clear though, they're out to take a sucker. I think a accident the prior owner paid to fix to keep off carfax to drivers side and likely other gremlins on top of the many nicknack issues that were near enough to not want it alone.

A dealer full of RUF's didn't have a paint meter when I brought up it looks a sloppy respray, just clowns in Miami, Miami sucks as a people.

I was very tolerant and telling myself i'm buying the car not them, be careful but ignore them.

I do not want someone traveling or shipping this thing to them though is goal here, don't bother looking at it all, probably a fiero under there... jk