So I saw a 1998 ford explorer sport model, the two door version, for sale for 600 bucks
>inb4 ford exploder
the door handle was busted off on the passenger side and the bumper was sagging because the owner swung the front end into a pole or some shit. I get there and the interior is basically spotless, the fluids look good, it shifted gears perfectly and ran decently enouhg, but the heater isn't working. I could tell from listening that the armature was catching on something and making a grinding noise. I could also hear that the power steering pump would need to be replaced soon. So I suggested 400 bucks and they went with it which was strange. I drove it home and it handled and ran great but I noticed a knock coming from the rear end, I assumed it was because the u-joint hadn't been lubed so it was building up torque no big deal, when I got home I popped the hood of course the hydraulic props were broken, stop using those fucking things car manufacturers I saw the mass flow sensor was disconnected. I figured it was busted, but I'd plug it in anyways to see if it fails, and bizarrely it was working just fine. The knock I heard was after fire in the cat. I plugged in my OBD-II scanner and it came up with no errors after letting it idle for a couple minutes, the check engine light was on before because the MAF was disconnected. He told me the passenger side door didn't work at all, I didn't mind because I ain't got no friends. But I managed to wrench it open and it turns out the fucking thing was just stiff because there was no lubrication of the bearclaw or the the joints. After spraying some penetrating lube it works just fine, same story with the hatch. The bumper was also sagging because the bolt on the driver side was missing. I put a new one in and jacked it for a bit until it was as straight as I could manage, i'll need to heat up the brackets and bend them the rest of the way though. The only thing on there that required some semblance of work was re-rigging the left turn signal because it was just all disconnected for some fucking reason. Fucking 4WD worked and literally all the electronics in the thing worked which for a ford is some sort of black magic.
So my theory here is because the MAF was disconnected they thought the motor was dying because it wasn't getting the right air-fuel mixture making it dog, and they assumed the knock was the tranny. That's the only way I could justify selling such a nice car for 400 fucking dollars.
TL;DR I think I just scammed the mentally deficient out of an automobile.