buyer/seller dispute

[DooLittle]

You didn't hold up your end of the deal. Deal is off/broken. Seller has zero obligation to you.

[Saber402]

seller said that if payment had been made, they would have stuck to adding the free snake because that was the deal but no payment for so long makes the deal void in their eyes. especially since many other theoretical deals have been discussed since then but buyer decided they wanted to go back to original agreement, still no money down on anything tho and still may not have money for a couple of weeks to send

So you haven't made any payments, and you state you may not for a couple more weeks! And you still think the seller should stick with the original agreement? I don't see much sympathy with this one.

Remember that buying the snake is usually the cheapest part of the project. Make sure you are financially able to properly care for this or any animal (including vet visits) before you go down that road.

[Marrissa]

If I want something I pay in full as soon as my questions are answered. Cash is the only way to ensure you get the animal and at the agreed upon price. I think it's pretty nice he's still willing to work with you. When I start selling I won't be waiting around on people that don't keep their end of the bargain. To me if you really want the animal, you throw the money down. Now say it's a several thousand dollar snake and I don't have all the money at the time, I'd pay as much as I could and pay the rest as soon as I got the money. The shorter the payment plan the less that can go wrong.

[200xth]

I'm pretty sure rainbowreptiles is the seller not the buyer in this scenario.

[rainbowreptiles]

i am not the buyer, just trying to give a neutral description with facts and no bias.

[bcr229]

i am not the buyer, just trying to give a neutral description with facts and no bias.

A timeline may have helped, e.g. critter #1 first offered for sale on <date>, buyer contacted me on <date>, payment was due by <date>, did not hear from buyer again until <date> at which point I realized critter #2 was a <fill in the blank>, etc. Still neutral but with enough info for people to offer advice.

That said, if you are going to offer payments over time then you really need to draft and enforce some sort of standard agreement to help weed out the tire kickers from the serious buyers. I haven't sold any BP's or other herps but I've got two businesses selling other products (not animals) and these same types of issues arise with buyers all the time. There's also nothing wrong with firing a customer if the money you make isn't worth dealing with him.

[200xth]

A timeline may have helped, e.g. critter #1 first offered for sale on <date>, buyer contacted me on <date>, payment was due by <date>, did not hear from buyer again until <date> at which point I realized critter #2 was a <fill in the blank>, etc. Still neutral but with enough info for people to offer advice.

That said, if you are going to offer payments over time then you really need to draft and enforce some sort of standard agreement to help weed out the tire kickers from the serious buyers. I haven't sold any BP's or other herps but I've got two businesses selling other products (not animals) and these same types of issues arise with buyers all the time. There's also nothing wrong with firing a customer if the money you make isn't worth dealing with him.

I haven't sold any snakes. Hopefully, I will someday when they're breeding.

That said, I don't understand why any deal would be done with someone who can't bring at least some money to the table up front.

Full cash at time of sale is always preferred. Barring that, if a payment plan needs to be done, the buyer needs to show up with something to show he's serious. If you don't have the money to pay for everything at once that's one thing, but to start the deal with a promise to pay part of it at some point down the road (which you are then late on on top of everything else), that's not even close to a serious buyer, IMO.

[Darkbird]

I'm still new to this and haven't started selling yet, but I know as a buyer that if I miss an agreed upon payment/payoff date that its on me, not the seller. And I'm very grateful if something comes up and the seller doesnt bail, but I stay in contact too. As a seller, but not of snakes yet, I have been burned before on stuff like this. Had a guy put a deposit on something I was selling and forgot to make it clear that it was non-refundable. He bailed on me and demanded his deposit back after I had passed on selling the items several times. Too bad for him I had already spent some of it. Oh well, live and learn.

[rainbowreptiles]

it was 40 days ago now that the initial deal was discussed, two weeks ago that the first payment was to come in and then the extension was due about a week ago. there was no request for another extension, just a call on day 39 (almost a week later) asking if payment (an unstated deposit amount) could be sent in a "week or two or so" for the original deal 40 days ago. when the terms on that deal had changed, the buyer has become very upset. had the initial payment or even the payment due on the extended date come in i would have honored the deal but now that two different due dates have passed and no clear amount or date is in the future i can't see going with the original deal when i no longer even want to.

[rainbowreptiles]

the only reason i held the animal in the first place was the buyer/seller relationship had always been good. i was just trying to do a favor, learned my lesson i guess. hope it doesn't mess with my reputation in the future.