Big Surprise! Winner of General Lee auction backs out on $10 million bid
click above image to see more views of John and his General Lee
We all knew this was coming. As many expected, the person who entered the winning bid of $9,900,500 for John Schneider's personal 1969 Dodge "General Lee" Charger on eBay Motors last week has withdrawn it. Or at least, that's what we're led to believe by negative feedback left by Schneider, who on eBay goes by johnsebiz, on the profile of fellow eBay user fishbashr1.
Schneider left the comment, "This is the guy that for fun, decided to bid on the General Lee. Thanks...." The comment was left at 2:57PM on Sunday, May 7th.
On the auction page for item #250108256198, fishbashr1 is listed as the winning bidder, which is pretty damning evidence that this transaction is not going to take place and that the General will remain in Schneider's possession.
We know what you're really worried about, though. What will become of the sequel to Schneider's self-financed film Collier & Co., Hot Pursuit! that was reportedly going to be financed by the sale of John's General Lee? It's in fate's hands now.
Thanks for the tip, WiZZla!
[Source: Digg]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
SWAT LAX 12:58PM (5/09/2007)
What's even better is that someone who goes by 'dirtrider2004' has bid on a bunch of the auctions where 'fishbashr1' is the seller and has left 6 additional negative feedback with messages like: "Hey! It's fun to place bids for nothing! Pay-backs are +itch!"
I guess fishbashr1's not going to be selling any more knives.
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F451 1:02PM (5/09/2007)
Does this mean they'll be sending me a Second Chance Offer? ;)
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Avinash machado 1:02PM (5/09/2007)
There ought to be a law against fake biders.
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ckm 1:07PM (5/09/2007)
I think that fishbashr1 is likely to have his ebay and paypal accounts canceled. That might not be the end of it as binding on an auction then walking away from the deal can bring a whole lot of troubles, particularly at this level. People think that ebay is a game, but you are still entering into a contract when you bid on an item. Since this was such a high profile auction, I would think that ebay and the seller would be inclined to send the lawyers in...
Honestly, I'm surprised that, passed a certain level, they didn't require a deposit or bank letter of credit. That's usually what is done in high-end auctions, to make sure this sort of thing does not happen.
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felipe 1:34PM (5/09/2007)
his computer should be smashed.
never allowed on the internet again.
imagine the biggest loser in your HS. this douche has them all beat.
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aaron 1:46PM (5/09/2007)
"imagine the biggest loser in your HS"
Okay, I have one in mind.
"this douche has them all beat."
That may be a stretch considering the guy I'm thinking of.
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andybee 1:49PM (5/09/2007)
look at his older feedback though +119. Much better than his current auctions. I wonder if his account was act
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andybee 2:00PM (5/09/2007)
Sorry, I mean hacked :)
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paul34 2:22PM (5/09/2007)
I'll give him $100 for it.
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wiggyx 3:30PM (5/09/2007)
He'll just sell to the next highest bidder that actually has the funds to pay for it. I'd imagine that at least the 5 top bids are a fraudulent. It'll prolly end up going for closer to his 1 mil. reserve price in the end.
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Mike 3:36PM (5/09/2007)
Ha ha yeah exactly big surprise.
In other news: water is wet and the sky is blue.
Only a moron would have paid that for the Gen. Lee.
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bernie 4:06PM (5/09/2007)
Offer it to the 2nd chance bidder for $4 million or whatever. It's still a ton of money.
eBay needs to track down the winning bidder and sue his ass just because this kind of thing happens way too often. Eliminating bidders who are not pre-approved and have fewer than 10 transactions would help.
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Don 5:10PM (5/09/2007)
I'm thinking his account got hacked.
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Kevin 5:40PM (5/09/2007)
Unfortunately, you can't really force someone to honor their bid. There are myriad reasons for backing out: perhaps the source of money falls through, or when bidding on multiple items- perhaps a better auction was won...
Now, of course, I'm sure this guy was just being an idiotic lowlife here, but that's what ratings are for.
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Chet 9:12PM (5/09/2007)
Serves the owner right for doing it on ebay in the first place. A million bucks? On ebay? Come on. I mean, sure, the fake bidder is a louse, but how do you not KNOW your million-dollar auction is going to get jacked on what is essentially an anonymous website? Then again, this was a great way to get free publicity for the REAL General Lee auction... ;)
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FM 12:34AM (5/10/2007)
It was way obvious..
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Geoff Trowbridge 12:16PM (5/10/2007)
The user just changed his eBay ID. It's now "madysdadi".
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Steve 12:32PM (5/10/2007)
You can sell real cars on eBay and do well. I've sold a couple of my cars and bikes there and had great experiences and got solid money for them.
You can also pre-screen your bidders if you want to bother. An article I saw today indicated that eBay tried to get Schneider's manager to do this but he didn't want to take the time. I guess he's rather pay one of the land auction houses 10% of the value of the car to do this rather than do it himself and save the $999,900 difference by selling it on eBay and paying less than $100 for the whole thing.
I think this auction got totally out of control and I imagine that the seller was more interested in the publicity than in actually selling the car. If you watched the auction, you would have also noted that Schneider also probably told $10k worth of autographed Dukes of Hazzard garbage thanks to the huge attention this sale got.
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Mike 5:43PM (5/11/2007)
I'd love to know how a Guy that sells .99 cent items even got approved to bid on the General. You had to be pre approved before you could bid. I also see that he is tring to hide by using a new ID. Shouldn't E-Bay ban him??
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Mike 5:45PM (5/11/2007)
Well I e-mailed the Bidder. According to him, his account was hacked into and the News should break tomorrow explaining the situation. We'll wait to see
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