Stolen!

Have I mentioned auto transport is a nightmare? I know I have, but it’s worth repeating: auto transport is a nightmare.

After waiting three weeks for the Aerostar to be delivered, after multiple promised delivery dates were missed, after the excuses stopped making sense, and after my shipper became less and less willing to share the location of the vehicle, I decided something had happened to it and I contacted the police.

Within several hours of working with the local police department in Colorado, we had learned a number of things:

• The duo shipping my car are close friends who have a history of stealing from people

• The location updates and delivery dates I had been given over the past few weeks were entirely fictional

• The driver who picked up the car was seemingly out of his mind (the officer let me listen in on a phone call where he started screaming at her for asking basic questions like “where is the car?”)

The vehicle was listed officially as stolen, and with that, I contacted my insurance company to start their own investigation as well.

Long story short, I randomly received the supposed location of the vehicle the following day. A parking lot at a motel near the Denver airport.

I shared the location with the Denver PD, and sure enough, they found it sitting there. Out of curiosity, I called the hotel to ask if they’ve noticed a van of this description in their parking lot, and the woman said “I’ve been wondering about that one, it’s been here for a while!”.

Have I mentioned auto transport is a nightmare?

So here’s where we’re at: the car is in the custody of the Denver PD, there aren’t any car keys with it – it cannot be unlocked or started, I’ve been scammed out of $500, and a month has gone by and my car never left Colorado.

Back to the drawing board we go...