Great guide... very good info! I always email the seller before making a bid/purchase. Ask a few questions, I can get a pretty good idea of who I am dealing with by their responses...
b) If it sounds too good, it probably is.
I recently saw a webmaster trying to sell a traffic trading website for $8,000. He claimed it was making about $5,000 a month and simply didn't have time for it anymore. He even had pay pal stats. In this scenario err on the side of caution and use common sense. Your mind will be telling you "Shit this is a great deal...I better buy this before someone else does" But slow down, do your research and rethink. Screen shots can be edited can be copied from another website. I would not touch this website with a 50 ft pole!
LOL - I bet I know who you are talking about here!
Like this and the part about incredible claims...you are totally right... sometimes it just takes a little common sense. Think about it, if you had a website that was making $20,000 a month, would you sell it for less than a years revenue? I have seen plenty of sites for sale, they claim they are making 10,000 a month and are selling for 12,000 - I mean come on ....if you are smart enough to make that kind of money you would be smart enough to not sell it for cheap.
And watch out for the price inflation for back links & page rank - these are not set in stone, you could end up paying much more than a site is worth if you get suckered in. Especially if they have been faked - High page rank & massive back links can make a site look good and if they are genuine even better, but that does Not justify a huge price tag.