Unfortunately there has always been and always will be individuals seeking opportunities to separate one from his/her hard earned money. The opportunities for these scammers to conduct these scams are predominately provided by the honest buyer. It is up to each of us to prevent the opportunity to be scammed.
The most effective way to protect ourselves is to exercise our own due diligence when it comes to purchasing anything from anyone. We must educate ourselves before we make any major purchase for any amount we can not afford to lose.
Using a bit of common sense also goes a long way. We've all heard that if something sounds to be to good to be true, it probably is. A basic example is if the value of an item is $25k and someone is selling it for $20k, then a red flag should pop up in your mind. Learn to trust our common sense and investigate why somone is willing to loose money when selling an item. Why would a stranger selling such a high valued item for anything less than it's value. Why would we allow ourselves to blindly send a large sum of $ to a stranger a half a world away?
Why not just leave the doors to your home wide open, or why not leave your brand new expensive car sitting with a full tank of gas and keys in a high risk crime area?
Common sense says we wouldn't. No matter how much we want to trust someone to be honest, it's just not realistic to do so. We can only rely on and trust
ourselves when it comes to protecting our valuables, our money.
If we want buy a $20k watch then we must be able to afford it. If not, then maybe that $20k watch is not for us right now. Once we do committ to purchasing that $20k watch, then we should only do so by using an authorized dealer with a positive and proven business history. If we choose to buy from an individual, try to buy locally from somone that you can meet face to face. Remember to "buy the seller." Only buy from somone that is willing to meet you at an authorized dealer to have the watch checked out and confirmed by dealers watchsmith. At the very least arrange for your purchase amount to be held in escrow until you can have the watch authorized by an AD. Honestly, doing anything less only opens the opportunity to be scammed. Don't allow the opportunity to be scammed.
