ORLANDO, Fla. — A UCF student said he was scammed out of thousands of dollars after he bought a new truck from a popular app called "Offer-Up.”
- UCF student scammed of $20,000 from 'Offer Up'
- Anthony Callegari was trying to purchase a truck
- Callegari later found out truck was stolen
The student said the truck was stolen, and now he is out of $20,000 as police investigate, hoping officers can track down the person responsible.
Anthony Callegari was searching for a new vehicle, and he was due to graduate in a couple weeks.
The F-150 was Anthony Callegari's graduation and birthday present, and now it's gone along with $20,000.
"You felt like you could do so much after graduation, and now you can't even drive to work," Callegari said.
He found the truck on the app “Offer Up” and met up with the seller at a Racetrac in Daytona Beach.
"I went to Daytona Beach (to) test the car, title came back clean, the VIN came back clean. I had no reason to question him or the vehicle. I purchased the vehicle, and it all happened too fast," Callegari said.
Two hours after Callegari got the truck, he took it to the DMV to transfer the title and found out he was a given a phony copy from a dealership that actually has the F-150 on its lot.
Later he found out the truck was stolen.
"It looked perfect it looked just like a real title," Callegari said.
Callegari said after he figured out something wasn't right. He tried to call the man, but his phone was already disconnected.
Investigators came out to his home the next day to check out the truck.
"They found a hidden VIN underneath the vehicle that showed it was stolen. He smashed the window and when he took off, the VIN he found out that there was multiple VINs stacked on top of each other. This was done more than once to this car," Callegari said.
Callegari said he found a GPS tracker in the glove box inside the truck and believes the suspect planned to come back for it.
"We were afraid they were going to come and steal it again because of the tracker. The first thing we did was box it in we used another vehicle in front of it so they couldn't take it," Callegari said.
Callegari said it hurt watching years of savings and family donations pulled away on the back of a tow truck.
"I just had shivers all throughout my body. I'm thinking there goes everything there goes four years of full-time work and full-time school," Callegari said.
He just wants to find the person and leave other potential buyers with this advice.