Hi Everyone,
I'm brand new to this forum, and was very excited to be purchasing my first scooter until I realized I had made a very bad blunder that I am now attempting to salvage. Feel free to judge. And then after judging me, I would appreciate any wisdom you can offer me (For the sake of my wife, please help!)
I have been researching scooters for a little while, looking to find the right scooter for my wife's birthday present. She has been talking about having a scooter to drive to our local beaches and around town for errands, and I wanted to surprise her for her birthday this year with a nice new toy. I decided to get something that is around 150-170 CCs. My wife likes scooters with a more retro vibe, so after lots of research and reading through a bunch of posts on different forums including this one, I settled on the Kymco Like 150i. I had my heart set on the pearl white model with the red seat (my wife had showed me a white retro looking scooter she liked the look of, so this was perfect).
After speaking with multiple Kymco dealers in our local area near Seattle, I was told that inventory is REALLY low everywhere right now, and that companies like Kymco are not returning calls from dealerships, and distribution isn't able to keep up with demand due to challenges from Covid. No local dealers had any Like 150s in stock at all, and weren't able to order anything for the foreseeable future.
I was crushed, yet still remained determined to find my pearl white Like 150. I started looking around to see if there were any dealerships in nearby states that might have the bike I was looking for (we are in Washington State). While perusing CycleTrader, I found a dealership in Las Vegas called EuroCycle that had the exact bike I was looking for. Their website showed a 2019 pearl white Like 150i (with Noodoe). It was listed as "pre-owned," but with just 21 miles on the odometer. Their website even said that they ship bikes nation-wide. I was elated! The price listed on their site seemed reasonable but I wanted to call and see what their dealership fees were and what shipping would run. Side note: It was quite late at night when I discovered this listing on the EuroCycles site. I read through the listing description, and clicked through a number of the photos, and then decided to call the dealership the next morning and see if the bike was in stock and check on dealership fees/shipping fees, etc.
I spoke with a gentleman the next morning who told me the bike was in fact there. I asked about their out-the-door-cost for the bike, and he said they would sell the bike for $2700, and that including taxes, shipping (shipping to Seattle is $675 through the shipping company they use), and dealership fees, the total cost would come to around $4,175. I was expecting to pay around $4,000 total after taxes and fees if I bought the bike locally here, so needless to say I was pretty excited to get a bike that was virtually brand new shipped right to my door for about the same cost. He sent me the cost break down that showed all the fees, etc. The next step if I wanted to lock in the deal was to pay a $1,000 non-refundable deposit on the bike.
Now, I'm going to share the link to the bike listing here with you all to look at, so you can see where my own stupidity comes into play. Here is the link to the listing on the EuroCycle site:
https://inventory.rideeurocycle.com/--xInventoryDetail?id=10497269 If you are actually paying attention and looking at every photo that the dealer has listed on the site, you will notice that there are a couple of pictures that clearly show a decent-sized crack on the left rear panel below the seat. Did I address this with the dealer when I called about the bike, you ask? No, I did not. Did I see those pictures the night before when I was up very late frantically searching for the Pearl-white Kymco Like 150i that I had decided my wife needed to have? Somehow, I did not. I still have no idea how I didn't register those pics when I was clicking through the listing.
The picture I DID bring up with the dealer before putting down my non-refundable deposit (yes, I did put my non-refundable deposit down after purchasing a vehicle history report that didn't show any red flags or known accident reports) was a picture that showed the ABS light on, and I asked the dealer if the light stayed on and if there was any known issues with the ABS. I DID ask in that moment whether there was also any other known damage, and the gentleman adeptly addressed my question about the ABS without really addressing the question about "any other known damage."
Anyway, you see my situation now. I put down a non-refundable deposit down on a bike that had damage shown in pictures on a website for a dealership 1100 miles away from me. Yeah, major MAJOR screw up on my part for a very expensive birthday gift for my wife. And I feel sick about it.
I would love to hear from those of you on this subreddit who are clearly smarter than I am:
1) What would you do at this point after realizing you somehow missed the pictures online with the damaged panel?
2) Is that panel difficult to replace? Would it be possible to order a new panel piece and install it myself, or take it to a local Kymco dealer and have them do it? I am realizing that it's not so easy to find OEM body parts for Kymco scooters, which is slightly concerning, but hoping this forum can help!
Thanks for getting to the end of my embarrassing tale. Let the judgment (and wise counsel) begin!
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