Unethical or Just Lucky?

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Not unethical.

AtLarge said:
"Hypothetical" scenario.

A widow is disposing of some of her recently-deceased husband's possessions, including an old pool cue. The cue-ignorant widow is advised to contact Knowledgeable Cue Dealer (KCD) to discuss the cue. KCD goes to her house, inspects the cue, and asks her how much she wants for it. She says she doesn't know, it has just been lying around in the attic for most of the past 35 years, .............., how about $250? KCD pays her the money and leaves with the cue.

The next day, KCD calls one of his cue-collecting customers and sells the highly inlaid Balabushka cue for $25,000.

Was KCD unethical, just lucky, or something else?
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In my business I run across things like this fairly often. (not cues but stuff in general) Things that are worth something to someone but the person who owns them isn't interested in trying to get top dollar or spending time getting multiple inputs. I recently had a customer that had ordered about 30k worth of furniture and when it arrived she didn't like the color and told the gardener to get rid of it. He didn't quite understand what "get rid of it" meant and asked her to clarify and she just said to take it to the dumps. So he kept it obviously. If the KCD buys a cue for $250 and sells it for $300 is this unethical? You can't look at the "profit" as the determining factor for it being unethical. It's all relative.
 
Johnnyt said:
I hope he sleeps well at night, and I hope someone puts him to sleep. I hope she sues his ass for 3 times more than he made on the theft. Johnnyt
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actually if it was me that did this deal. i'd probably wait until the old lady was in a home or dead before i tried to sell the cue. when you stand to make that much money what's a few years?

since she doesn't know much about cues the chances of her finding out what the cue was really worth is pretty slim
 
AtLarge said:
"Hypothetical" scenario.

A widow is disposing of some of her recently-deceased husband's possessions, including an old pool cue. The cue-ignorant widow is advised to contact Knowledgeable Cue Dealer (KCD) to discuss the cue. KCD goes to her house, inspects the cue, and asks her how much she wants for it. She says she doesn't know, it has just been lying around in the attic for most of the past 35 years, .............., how about $250? KCD pays her the money and leaves with the cue.

The next day, KCD calls one of his cue-collecting customers and sells the highly inlaid Balabushka cue for $25,000.

Was KCD unethical, just lucky, or something else?
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Its wrong and if she needs the money, it's despicable.
 
Unethical. However, how unethical depends on who set the price.

Imagine that KCD says, "I'm not sure what it's worth, but I'll gladly buy it from you; how much would you like?" The widow replies, "Well, it's been in the attic for 35 years, how about $250?"

Well, KCD lied, he obviously knew how much it was worth, so it's still unethical. But he can claim ignorance, which takes it out of the realms of fraud and places responsibility on the seller. Seller was very ignorant/naive/stupid in this case.
 
buyer (and now seller) beware

I was an electrical inspector for some years. I went into people's homes and inspected work done by contractors, and sometimes, the homeowners would show me the bill and ask me if it was a fair price......well, being a government employee, I could offer no opinions on the matter, but the robbing and fleecing was tremendous at times.....One job in my mind should've cost $1400-1500, and they were charged over $10,000....another job was worth maybe $200 was charged over $1000....It bothered me not to be able to tell them they were getting robbed, but when I told the stories to other inspectors, some would say, well, it's the people who are getting robbed who bear the responsibility...that's why you're supposed to get multiple estimates....one even said, "if you think about it, it's not a crime; using an example of 2 people going to a car dealer to buy a new car.....one might do his homework and pay $5000 less then the sticker price...the other just walks in, looks at the sticker price, and says, I'll take it..." Unfortunately, in this capitalistic society, if you don't do your homework or research, there will be plenty of people selling bridges and waterfront property......
 
bumpypickle said:
In my business I run across things like this fairly often. (not cues but stuff in general) Things that are worth something to someone but the person who owns them isn't interested in trying to get top dollar or spending time getting multiple inputs. I recently had a customer that had ordered about 30k worth of furniture and when it arrived she didn't like the color and told the gardener to get rid of it. He didn't quite understand what "get rid of it" meant and asked her to clarify and she just said to take it to the dumps. So he kept it obviously. If the KCD buys a cue for $250 and sells it for $300 is this unethical? You can't look at the "profit" as the determining factor for it being unethical. It's all relative.
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Not the same thing.

If a mechanic, or a jeweler, or a contractor, or anyone who wields some expertise in a field is asked for their opinion as to the cost or the potential value then they are not supposed to lie in order to sweeten the deal for themselves.

This, as described, was a completely unethical move and is possibly illegal.

The dealer had to have some idea what it "could be" and should have explained that to the buyer. No one is looking at the profit and saying that the dealer is unethical for making the money.

If the dealer had said, it might be a Bushka and if so then worth more than $10,000 or it might be junk and worth nothing, what do you want for it? and she said just take it for $250 then NO PROBLEM - her loss.

But if he deliberately downplays the true potential value in order to "steal" it then that's fraud, or it should be.

Your story about the woman throwing away $30K in furniture doesn't apply. She knew full well the cost of what she was "getting rid of" and didn't care. So it doesn't matter if the furniture goes to the dump or the gardener's house.

This sounds like a case of someone who is very knowledgeable taking advantage of someone with no knowledge. Cons like this take place every day and it's really sad to place the blame on the victim.
 
bumpypickle said:
In my business I run across things like this fairly often. (not cues but stuff in general) Things that are worth something to someone but the person who owns them isn't interested in trying to get top dollar or spending time getting multiple inputs. I recently had a customer that had ordered about 30k worth of furniture and when it arrived she didn't like the color and told the gardener to get rid of it. He didn't quite understand what "get rid of it" meant and asked her to clarify and she just said to take it to the dumps. So he kept it obviously. If the KCD buys a cue for $250 and sells it for $300 is this unethical? You can't look at the "profit" as the determining factor for it being unethical. It's all relative.
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So its not unethical if you turn around and only make a small profit? The fact of the matter is that an expert was called in to give an apraisal and intentionally miscommunicated the info to the seller just to make money that the seller was entitled to. If you take your car to a mechanic and he bills you for 10x what the cost should be..is he being unethical? Or is this also "relative"?
 
Disgusting behavior period. No ifs ands or butts about it. People with morals like that and greed like that are a large reason why our country is where it is today. There is no fault on a woman who made a simple mistake of trusting someone too much. That man deserves a serious butt kicking. I could not look at myself in the mirror if I lived my life like that. There is no issue of relativity here either. There are not many things in life that truely are black and white, but this is one of them. We should treat our fellow human beings with a lot more respect than this.
 
wahcheck said:
I was an electrical inspector for some years. I went into people's homes and inspected work done by contractors, and sometimes, the homeowners would show me the bill and ask me if it was a fair price......well, being a government employee, I could offer no opinions on the matter, but the robbing and fleecing was tremendous at times.....One job in my mind should've cost $1400-1500, and they were charged over $10,000....another job was worth maybe $200 was charged over $1000....It bothered me not to be able to tell them they were getting robbed, but when I told the stories to other inspectors, some would say, well, it's the people who are getting robbed who bear the responsibility...that's why you're supposed to get multiple estimates....one even said, "if you think about it, it's not a crime; using an example of 2 people going to a car dealer to buy a new car.....one might do his homework and pay $5000 less then the sticker price...the other just walks in, looks at the sticker price, and says, I'll take it..." Unfortunately, in this capitalistic society, if you don't do your homework or research, there will be plenty of people selling bridges and waterfront property......
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In this case it is the buyer's responsibility to check prices. However IF the contractor promises the best materials and then installs the cheapest ones then he robbed the customer.

There is nothing wrong with charging what the market will bear and also nothing wrong with offering a lowball price. There is however something wrong with MISREPRESENTATION in order to make the deal happen. If a contractor comes in a says he wants $10,000 for a $1500 job and he justifies it with 20 years of experience, being bonded, best materials and so on and then he hires day laborers from in front of Home Depot and does a shitty job and has no bond then he misrepresented himself and lied to get the job. Same thing when someone is asked for their opinion and they give the asker false information in order to enrich themselves - it's a con job and is illegal.

You know what sucks. It's not illegal to lie on a job application.

I had a woman come in with a glowing resume. I hired her pending a background check.

None of her story checked out and she stole checks from our checkbook and managed to cash some of them at a check cashing place.

I couldn't press charges for the lying on the application but I did for the check fraud. The check cashing place tried to come after me for the money and I told them that they were out of luck. She even used a driver's license that looked NOTHING like her to cash the checks.

Ultimately it is each individual's responsibility to protect themselves that is true. But ask yourselves if you really want to live in the sort of society where every transaction requires both sides to have graduated from Harvard Law and also have the street smarts of a hustler from Compton?
 
dabarbr said:
It wouldn't surprise me if the friend received a "finders fee".
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Wouldn't surprise me either. Especially if the friend hangs out on AZ and knows the potential value of 30 year old cues.
 
JB Cases said:
Not the same thing.

If a mechanic, or a jeweler, or a contractor, or anyone who wields some expertise in a field is asked for their opinion as to the cost or the potential value then they are not supposed to lie in order to sweeten the deal for themselves.

This, as described, was a completely unethical move and is possibly illegal.

The dealer had to have some idea what it "could be" and should have explained that to the buyer. No one is looking at the profit and saying that the dealer is unethical for making the money.

If the dealer had said, it might be a Bushka and if so then worth more than $10,000 or it might be junk and worth nothing, what do you want for it? and she said just take it for $250 then NO PROBLEM - her loss.

But if he deliberately downplays the true potential value in order to "steal" it then that's fraud, or it should be.

Your story about the woman throwing away $30K in furniture doesn't apply. She knew full well the cost of what she was "getting rid of" and didn't care. So it doesn't matter if the furniture goes to the dump or the gardener's house.

This sounds like a case of someone who is very knowledgeable taking advantage of someone with no knowledge. Cons like this take place every day and it's really sad to place the blame on the victim.
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mechanics aren't supposed to lie to sweeten the deal for themselves but they do.
 
poolplayer2093 said:
mechanics aren't supposed to lie to sweeten the deal for themselves but they do.
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This reminds me of a comedy bit I heard once.


Guy says, "I don't know anything about cars. The other day mine wouldn't start so I called a mechanic. He asked me what was wrong with it and I said that all I know is when I get in it and get out of it it's still in the same place. So I had it taken to the garage. Turns out its the radiator, whatever that is and mine is a special one made of gold. But I got a discount price of only $10,000 to replace it."

:-)
 
well..............

JB Cases said:
In this case it is the buyer's responsibility to check prices. However IF the contractor promises the best materials and then installs the cheapest ones then he robbed the customer.

Ultimately it is each individual's responsibility to protect themselves that is true. But ask yourselves if you really want to live in the sort of society where every transaction requires both sides to have graduated from Harvard Law and also have the street smarts of a hustler from Compton?
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We do live in the sort of society where you have to check prices and know what you should be paying....this goes from checking your receipt at the supermarket counter to a complete residential remodel ...... otherwise you are not being a smart consumer and are opening yourself up for honest mistakes, gouging, or outright robbery, all which cost you more money than it should..............
 
Very unforturnate, but i think it would be common sense to not sell an item to the person you brought in to appraise it, then immediatly offers to buy it at that price. I would figure that should set off a huge red flag to the seller.

That being said it is unethical of the appraiser but should have been avioded
 
It's incredibly unethical and immoral. I can remember cleaning out an old woman's house years ago. There was crap everywhere (she was the worst packrat I had seen in years). Her son was just winging stuff everywhere to be dumped. I made sure to look through everything and put stuff aside because he didn't know what it was and I'm not so sure she did either because she was in the final stages of Alzheimers. Among the things I saved from being pitched was an entire set of antique milk glass dishes and an entire set of antique solid silver utensils.

I could never do that to someone. Now if they knew what, how much it was worth and still wanted to get rid of it at that price I could deal with that.
 
I spent 20 years in the antiques business and learned early on that when it comes to money, ethics are the first thing to disappear. Of course it was unethical on the dealers part. Those who don't understand this are lying to themselves.

AS far as checking the price, she did. An appraiser should never buy something he appraised.
 
Well, my "hypothetical" scenario involving the widow and KCD has certainly provoked some interesting responses. Some respondents assumed things that I didn't say and then made judgments based on the assumptions. A few respondents gave KCD a pass. But the overwhelming majority clearly felt that KCD was unethical, egregiously so, in fact.

As the scenario was written, the difference in knowledge between the parties was extreme -- total ignorance on the part of the seller and complete knowledge on the part of the buyer. In many real-life cases, the knowledge difference isn't that extreme, but ethical questions can still arise.

As the scenario was written, KCD's financial gain was extreme also -- a 9,900 percent profit (before any expenses he might have had). In many real-life cases, the financial gain is fairly minor, but ethical questions can still arise.

The analogies involving pawn shops, flea markets, garage sales, the art world, real estate transactions, gun sales, antique sales, and auto mechanics all made for interesting and thought-provoking reading.

Now -- did what I described actually happen? I don't know for sure. I have no first-hand knowledge of it. If something similar did happen, the facts might have been quite a bit different from what I wrote, which was based on something I once heard in a pool hall.

Some (most, we hope) cue dealers are ethical and some are not -- just like any other occupation. I think it is worthwhile for all of us to reflect more often on what is ethical, not just what is legal.

Thank you all for your thoughts and comments.
 
The other tragedy that no one mentioned yet, is that the cue was lying around in the guys' attic for 35 years.

But yeah, this would be dirty pool so to speak. Some one sells something at a garage sale is one thing, but this gal called the guy for the express purpose of finding out the value and he played her.
 
now for a true story of ethics

AtLarge said:
Well, my "hypothetical" scenario involving the widow and KCD has certainly provoked some interesting responses.
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A friend of mine owned a gun shop in a very small town. A very poor elderly black lady that had lived in the town all of his life brought in a very old rifle in good condition and told him that she needed $250 for it. (The fact that she was poor, very old, and black is relevant, it also means that she was illiterate or very close to it and had no transportation to go somewhere else with the rifle.)

He knew that it was worth much more than that but not how much. He paid the $250 asking price. When he checked he found that the rifle was worth at least $2500 maybe more. $2250 was a very nice score in that day, more than he made most months. His first thought was to take the profit and keep his mouth shut since he could easily sell it out of town at the next gun show and nobody the wiser. It was the "smart" thing to do but he couldn't convince himself it was right. After a few days he sent word for the lady to come see him. She did, afraid he was wanting his money back.

He explained to her what the rifle was worth and told her that he couldn't afford to buy it but would find her a buyer and get the money to her. I can't remember if he charged a very small fee or commission, he didn't profit from the deal even the amount he would have had someone came in with the rifle knowing exactly what it was worth.

He is forever glad that he handled things the way he did. It makes it a lot easier to look at yourself in the mirror every morning.

Hu
 
ShootingArts said:
A friend of mine owned a gun shop in a very small town. A very poor elderly black lady that had lived in the town all of his life brought in a very old rifle in good condition and told him that she needed $250 for it. (The fact that she was poor, very old, and black is relevant, it also means that she was illiterate or very close to it and had no transportation to go somewhere else with the rifle.)

He knew that it was worth much more than that but not how much. He paid the $250 asking price. When he checked he found that the rifle was worth at least $2500 maybe more. $2250 was a very nice score in that day, more than he made most months. His first thought was to take the profit and keep his mouth shut since he could easily sell it out of town at the next gun show and nobody the wiser. It was the "smart" thing to do but he couldn't convince himself it was right. After a few days he sent word for the lady to come see him. She did, afraid he was wanting his money back.

He explained to her what the rifle was worth and told her that he couldn't afford to buy it but would find her a buyer and get the money to her. I can't remember if he charged a very small fee or commission, he didn't profit from the deal even the amount he would have had someone came in with the rifle knowing exactly what it was worth.

He is forever glad that he handled things the way he did. It makes it a lot easier to look at yourself in the mirror every morning.

Hu
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i'd like to point out that you put he and she when referring to this elderly black person.

second i'd just like to check this. Did you just sat that because she was black she was illiterate?
 
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