It's called Bullsit alright.
You can't check everything out, even after traveling 100s or more km to view something.
If someone says it's fully rebuilt (crank, gearbox, shocks, whatever) and they haven't been then you have every right to be angry and disappointed.
How do you tell if a crank is freshly rebuilt, (as claimed, and charged appropriately) or near the end of its life, but still in spec?
You can look in the exhaust port and see a new piston, but you can't see if it's bored appropriately.
How do you know it's not the last oversized piston, loose in the bore, while paying for a bike that's "just been rebuilt with the first oversized piston"?
I bought a bike from a shop, Xtreme motorbikes Forestville, WA, that was "ready to race". Shipped from the other side of the country. Neither wheel could be tightened due striped threads, etc, etc.
I drove a few hrs, across the boarder to buy a modern bike that was described as "can't pick it from a new bike". It was red with rust in places, the muffler had been cut open and rewelded, etc. At least only my time and petrol were waisted on that one.
Sure the buyer must be aware, but lying is not ok.
Really the dishonesty is barely different to selling a known stolen bike.
On that note.
What can we do to reduce our chances of buying a stolen VMX bike? REVS is no use right?