This is what I was wondering. Did Gary actually say “buy” or did he say something more like: “Hey, we’re getting a new car, does Hal want the old one?” and the F-I-L just assumed he was offering to sell, not knowing about the previous gift? It sounds to me more like a kids game of telephone where you start out with “I love my grandma’s apple pie” and at the end of the chain it’s “I wear my grandma’s underwear.”
I got my fingers crossed for something lost in translation. If it turns out he really wants to sell the car back to you I suggest you ask to see the tire iron then knee cap him with it. 
Maybe he intends to sell it to you for one penny. If he just gives it to you, don’t you have to pay the government taxes on it’s estimated value, as opposed to its sale price?
Apologies in advance if this is too much of a hijack, but…
A similar sort of thing kinda happened to me a couple of years ago, albeit minus the jaw-dropping, what-an-asshole! epilogue.
My wife and I needed a new car, so her parents sold us a fully-loaded, barely-used, late-model Ford 500 for next to nothing. (Our current car at the time, my '99 Civic hatchback, ran just fine and was well taken care of, but we had outgrown it, with the birth of our daughter.)
So, wanting to pay the favor forward, I inquired with a few work acquaintances as to if anyone knew of anyone in dire need of a free car (my little Honda).
That’s how I met Robert, a 19-year-old single father (the mother was messed up on meth), working only part-time 'cause he didn’t own any reliable transportation. After confirming the particulars of his situation, I decided to give him the car, free and clear.
When we went to the County Clerk to register the title transfer, I learnt that in the great state of Texas (surprise, surprise), you can’t just give a car to someone who’s not an immediate family member. You have to sell it to them.
So I “sold” my dear little Civic to Robert. For $5.
Then the clerk kindly informed me that since it was a sale, sales tax had to be paid on the transaction.
“Well, how much is the sales tax?” inquirez I.
“Well, Kelly Blue Book has your car at around $1,600.00 [no way the car was worth that much], so tax on that will be around $215.00.”
Knowing that this poor single dad didn’t have that kind of money, I “spotted” him and paid all the taxes and fees and such, so he wound up technically owing me for the car ($5) plus the $215.00.
I told him not to sweat it, to just pay me when he could. Two years later, still haven’t heard a peep from him. And there have been a couple of times that I could’ve really used the money. I’m not angry at him, though; he probably really hasn’t ever had it, to give me. No biggie. I really hope he’s doing well, and taking care of his little girl.
I am, however, pissed off at the state of Texas, for making it fuck-nigh impossible to just up and do a kind thing for somebody. I had to pay to give my car to a needy kid. :mad:
Cross Gary off the Xmas list for sure. Truly, if he indeed wants to sell you back the car you gave him, he is a jerk. And who needs more jerks in their life? Hope the rest of everything gets better and soon.
How does one forget when someone gives you a free car? Short of early onset dementia or brain tumor, that is…
I vote for miscommunication until you’ve actually talked to Gary, too - I can see Gary’s boss knowing that Gary was looking to sell the car, but not knowing that it originally was a gift from you. Were you able to mention to Gary or Gary’s boss that you’re looking for a cheap car (i.e. free)?
Either he was joking and your fil misunderstood, or he’s an asswipe. Ain’t no way you forget someone outright giving you a car, or any other grand gesture of generosity when you’re up against the wall like that.
Before you write him off entirely, I’d call him up laughing about the utterly ludicrous conversation you had with your fil. Poor old guy must be losing it to think Gary would offer to sell your old car back to you. If it was a misunderstanding, you get it cleared up and there’s no bad feelings (and maybe you get your car back). If it wasn’t a misunderstanding but he still has some vestigial sense of shame, he can pretend it was a misunderstanding and save face (and you look like the good guy for not automatically assuming the worst of him.) And if it wasn’t a a misunderstanding and he has no sense of shame, you have him there to tell him right to his face what a thankless, graceless, classless piece of shit he is.
I vote this.
Maybe Gary is yanking his bosses’ (your FIL) chain?
Seconded. I can’t believe someone would have that much gall.
That Gary sounds like a … a …
I guess we don’t have a word for this. Nobody’s ever been this big an asshole before.
Ok, talked to my FIL and it would seem that we can go with “miscommunication”, at least for now.
Gary is looking to sell the car, and FIL knew we were looking for a cheap car. However, it turns out that Gary never specifically said anything to my FIL apart from “if you know anyone looking for a car, I’m selling”. My FIL might have made it sound like Gary offered to sell it to us, but that doesn’t seem to be the case now.
After talking with my FIL again, I reminded him that it was us that gave Gary the car in the first place – something he had forgotten about. He was immediately pissed, and told me he’d “have a talk with Gary about it”. I told him not to, that this was between Gary and me, and my FIL told me he’d keep quiet. This, however, is more than likely not what will happen. I love my FIL like he was my own, but I know he has difficultly keeping his nose out of affairs where his daughter is concerned. I’ll swing by Gary’s place tomorrow evening and see what he has to say, and hopefully my FIL will have minded his business.
I’m a little peeved at Gary for looking to sell the car without talking to us, but it is his to do with as he chooses. It would’ve been nice to have him offer it to us, but whatever. I’ll reserve judgement until I talk to him tomorrow – for the moment, I’ll consider him back on the Christmas card list.
Anyone up for another karmic tale?
I know a woman who, finding herself in a dangerous relationship, flees to a shelter with her 4 children, 3 under 5yrs, one a babe in arms. The douchebag father refuses her any financial support and manages to stay under the radar working under the table jobs etc.
She returns to college, on social welfare, while the kids are in public school. Gets a job in IT, and manages, on one salary to raise 4 awesome children. One’s about to graduate from a masters program in health sciences, ones just entered Police College, one’s working and the last is still a teenager in high school.
One of the ways she managed, was by never renting anything larger than a 2 bedroom apartment. That meant, for the 15+ yrs she has, every night, made up a bed on the living room couch. No bedroom of her own, not even a bed. Take a minute to consider that, please.
She comes home from work one night and sees a note on the apartment entry with a phone number to call if you have this named network. It’s a Wifi thing, and it was her network. She calls the number and a woman explains, her mother, who lives in the building, is in declining help, and she’ll be staying for a while and would love to share her network, she’ll happily kick in. My friend is nothing if not generous and helpful, and, as she gets the connection through her work, she says, ‘no worries, no need to kick in, here’s the password, hope your Mom’s okay soon’. The woman is delighted and thanks her very much.
That was a couple of months ago. As the child going to police college is going in another town, as is the graduate student, suddenly she finds herself with an actual room of her own. She starts to look into buying a bed. But beds are expensive and she still has college to kick in for, so she puts it off and just sleeps on a cot for some weeks, still delighted to have her own room.
She comes home from work, one night, to see a sign saying Moving Sale Saturday. She’s a shy woman but thinks since it’s in the building she’ll go check it out.
I’m sure you can see where this is going. The mother is being moved to full care and they are selling the furniture. Including an almost brand new queen sized bed with a lovely headboard. When she asked how much, they said $50. She couldn’t believe her luck, she didn’t even have to have a delivery vehicle, just got one of her boys and his friends to move it!
It wasn’t until later that they all figured out the connection with the Wifi.
Karma is a funny thing, ain’t it?
Maybe if I waited a while it would make sense to me as well but right now I can’t figure it out.
What’s the connection between the Wifi and the bed?
Many years ago I had a hated Ford Taurus. It was working, but there were many problems, one after another. Cracked block, broken tranny (twice) etc. Finally I got myself a newer Honda Accord and gave the car to my dentist’s assistant on the condition that I never hear about the car again. It worked out well.
This was my thought as well. Maybe either Gary or your FIL didn’t want to come out and say “HEY, OP, you are poor now, want the car back?” and were trying to be tactful about it, but somehow it got all mistranslated.
I didn’t see this before my post above. Look, it seems to me that you are talking out of both sides of your mouth here, especially in the bolded part above. I’ll try to straighten it out for you: You gave him the car. It’s his car. He owns the car. There’s this car, and Gary owns it.
I own a car. Are you mad at me for not giving it to you? You should feel the same way about Gary and his car IMHO.
The person who was piggybacking on their Wi-Fi for free charged them $50 for the bed. In a perfect world she would have given it to them as thanks for the past free Internet.
But maybe they didn’t realize who they were selling it to.
I AM ROVOTRON. SENTIMENTALITY IS IMPERFECT. EMOTIONS ARE OUTDATED.
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Missed the edit window. The second-to-last sentence should read:
In a perfect world she would have given it to them (or at least charged a lot less) as thanks for the past few months of free Internet.