Scams when buying a used mower: BEWARE!

[GearHead36]

Buying anything used seems to be you are buying someone else's problems. There always seems to be that one thing the seller forgets to tell you.

You're not wrong, but... you CAN get good deals sometimes. I bought a Cub Pro Z 100 used, with 350 hrs. It looked like it had more hrs on it, and it needed work. Parts were broken. It sold for $9000 new, and I got it for $2000. I knew it wasn't going to be "like new". I was able to test drive it too. I spent a couple of weeks fixing it, and I have a great commercial mower now for an investment of ~$2500. The cylinder walls still have cross hatching, so the 350 hrs may have been correct. The seller didn't really forget to tell me anything, but he wasn't able to tell me everything about it, as he had just bought it from an auction. It turned out that it wasn't big enough for the pasture he wanted it for. He knew of a few problems, and informed me of them, but I found more once I dug into it. I bought it knowing that it was a gamble. The gamble paid off this time, but I also was able to see the mower firsthand, and deal with the seller face to face.

 

[freedhardwoods]

I have bought many, many vehicles, lawn mowers, tractors, equipment, etc and I can only remember buying 4 of them new. I ALWAYS go look and decide if it is worth buying, or sometimes gambling on. I have bought several things very cheap knowing I have to fix them before they can be used. With all the used things I have bought, I got a bad deal 3 or 4 times, but the vast majority of the time I did ok.

 

[freedhardwoods]

I happened to remember one area of my used "machine" adventures where I learned that cheap isn't good.

$100 washing machines are usually someones junk that will only work a few times. There are many people that have
$300 - $500 machines that are only selling because the wife wanted a new fancier model.

I have done better with $100 dryers, but $200 will usually get you a good one.