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Thread: Selling guns person to person

  1. #1
    Senior Member Cypher's Avatar

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    Selling guns person to person

    I'm sure it may depend on the state but when you sell a gun person to person is there anything required by law that you have to do as far as transferring it to the other person?

    Over the last several years I have sold some guns to individual persons that I did not know and do not know now so I started thinking about it and with talk of a possible new gun ban, registrations, finger printing etc. is there anything the government could require to prove a gun I used to own was sold?

    With the bad economy and all I'm sure a lot of gun owners have sold several of their guns over the years so it seems like a nightmare to accurately track.

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    Team GunsNet Gold 03/2014

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    New York State is very picky when it comes to transferring handguns.

    You are expected to get all the information to the permit office, get your permit changed, then pick up your purchase.

    The seller is supposed to get their permit to the office and have the item removed within a short time period, 10 days, I think.

    I don't believe there is any restriction on long guns, but I would get a receipt with the buyers name and address.

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    Forum Administrator Schuetzenman's Avatar

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    If a person will not show you a drivers's license, I would not sell them any weapon. They might just be paranoid and they might be a criminal. I don't really want to sell to either type. The paranoid type might lose it some day and that weapon you sold them might get used. The criminal, that's obvious why not.

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    Team Gunsnet Platinum 06/2016 ltorlo64's Avatar

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    Not sure what restrictions they could put in place but I bet they will try to insert the FFL process into all transactions.

    As for what I do now, I look at ID and their general demeaner. I record the day I sold it, how much was paid and the name of the person I sold it to. If I don't trust the person, which has not happened, I will not sell the gun to them. This means, if someone is talking about how they can't buy a gun in a store because they can't pass a background check, they just got out of jail, have been arrested for domestic violence, etc. I will not sell to them. When you read about the gun scams that NY mayor Bloomberg runs this is what he does. Have someone try to buy a gun from a private party and in general conversation just mention things that remove a person's right to own guns and then see if the seller will still sell the gun. I make sure I will not be on his list.
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    Guns Network Contributor 04/2013 El Laton Caliente's Avatar

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    There is no Federal requirement when a firearm is transferred in state and/or in person between non-dealers. NFA is a different deal.

    State laws vary widely, but in most there is little to no requirement in private, non-dealer transactions.

    In Texas and many other states you can even ship the non-NFA firearms within state without involving a FFL dealer.

    NRA-ILA has pretty good info on state laws nation wide as does packing.org...

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    Administrator Krupski's Avatar

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    Quote Originally Posted by Gunner1558 View Post
    New York State is very picky when it comes to transferring handguns.

    You are expected to get all the information to the permit office, get your permit changed, then pick up your purchase.

    The seller is supposed to get their permit to the office and have the item removed within a short time period, 10 days, I think.

    I don't believe there is any restriction on long guns, but I would get a receipt with the buyers name and address.
    You are correct. a HANDGUN in NY has to be listed on the CHL ("Pistol Permit").

    In order to sell it to another person, you transfer it to an FFL and get a receipt stating you no longer have the gun.

    The buyer then gets paperwork stating that he purchased the gun (but does not receive it yet).

    He takes the paperwork to the pistol permit office, gets it put on his permit and is given a "coupon" which allows him to pick up the gun.

    He goes back to the FFL, the FFL runs a NICS and if it comes back "proceed", he takes the gun home.

    The seller also has to have the pistol removed from HIS permit (which his receipt is used for). I don't know if there is a time limit.

    For long guns, FTF is legal, no NICS is required and there is no registration of any kind involved.

    With that said, I personally would not sell a long gun to anyone that I didn't know and trust.
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    Senior Member Cypher's Avatar

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    Quote Originally Posted by El Laton Caliente View Post
    There is no Federal requirement when a firearm is transferred in state and/or in person between non-dealers. NFA is a different deal.

    State laws vary widely, but in most there is little to no requirement in private, non-dealer transactions.

    In Texas and many other states you can even ship the non-NFA firearms within state without involving a FFL dealer.

    NRA-ILA has pretty good info on state laws nation wide as does packing.org...
    Ok, thanks. I have lived and sold in Kentucky and Indiana. My main concern is if they require all guns to be registered and think I still have one that I sold a long time ago. I am just trying to get a feel getting for what I should expect or what I need to do to protect myself if a stupid gun ban and mandatory registration takes place.

    It may not work too well if I say I lost them in a boating accident so I need to know how to legally respond when they want to know why I don't have gun xyz because I sold it 5 years ago and don't have any specific papers or receipts to show it.

  8. #8
    Team GunsNet Bronze 07/2011

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    Just like anything else sold you should really get a signed receipt both ways that way if the gun comes up as stolen and you got a receipt it will get you out of some trouble if not all but you would lose the gun but probably not go to jail for receiving stolen property.

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    Team GunsNet Silver 02/2014

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    Last gun I sold was to a Texas Narc that was known to me....6 months later, the gun n a ton of grass were snagged off the Cal coast.........I got out of that un and haven't sold one sence then!!!!!
    Dan

  10. #10
    Senior Member Broondog's Avatar

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    i always take down all of their DL info, date it and attach that document to my original purchase receipt, that has the serial number handwritten on the back, and deposit that stuff into my "SOLD" envelope.

    so far no one has ever complained about my CYA reasons for such info and many are in fact on board with the idea. if they were not forthcoming with the info they would not walk away with my firearm.
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  11. #11
    Registered User LAGC's Avatar

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    Quote Originally Posted by yankeedog View Post
    Just like anything else sold you should really get a signed receipt both ways that way if the gun comes up as stolen and you got a receipt it will get you out of some trouble if not all but you would lose the gun but probably not go to jail for receiving stolen property.
    Yeah, that was always my big concern buying private-party. No easy was to check to make sure the gun wasn't stolen. If you don't remember (or have proof of) who the seller was, you could end up in deep shit if you are found with a gun that was reported stolen.

    One solution would be to open up NICS so that both the private seller can check to make sure the buyer isn't disqualified, and so that the buyer can be assured that the gun isn't reported stolen. No need to necessarily go through an FFL, although that would still smack of de-facto registration since we all know the FBI never purges its background check records.

    As it stands now, if no paper-work is involved in the sale, the seller has nothing to worry about, all the risk is on the buyer.
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    Senior Member binky59's Avatar

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    Here in NY we don't have any regulation about FTF sales of longguns,but you still should CYA
    by doing your best to make sure that everything is legal. A women was arrested in the shooting
    case where he two people were killed by the nut that set his house on fire. She was arrested
    for falsifing records of the sales to a known felon. I always make two copies of the purchase
    information, drivers license, sale or purchase date, type of firearm including serial number.
    Just me and my monkey....

  13. #13
    Roadhouse Groupee

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    have them sign a reciept, thats all Ive ever done. but i live in the south

  14. #14
    Team GunsNet Bronze 07/2011

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    Here is the deal with the so called "gunshow" loophole, its not the guys on the inside of the building selling and buying, its the guys out in the parking lot selling to anybody who will shell out the money and that is where the felons and gang members hang out waiting for a quik buy/sell deal and very few people will see it go down.
    I have saw several times while I was just walking in the parking lot to or from the building, a car pulls through the lot and sees who is selling what and they stop 5 foot from the seller gets out of the car buys the gun and gets back in and maybe a total of 3 people saw the whole thing.
    I myself in the building walked up to a table and said "how much" they said a price, I paid and that was the end of it.
    Now I can't say for sure how frequent this is happening but at some point it has been noticed and used against the gunshow circuit and really the dealers are inside and the private sells go on outside is the norm anymore.

  15. #15
    Senior Member Cypher's Avatar

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    I guess what I am trying to get at is lets say I sold two pistols and two rifles over the past 10 years, when I originally bought them I went through the background checks at the gunshop where I got them.

    Fast forward to a hopefully fictional time when a massive gun ban is made law and guns are either confiscated or forced registration. Uncle nazi comes knocking on my door asking for the the pistols and rifles (actually I don't really know if they would have that info or not just doing the standard background checks) and I tell them I sold them years ago to individuals and don't have any receipt's or documentation to show it.

    At this point is there any chance of getting in trouble legally, is there anything I should say in this situation that will help protect me or do they technically have to take me for my word since you are not required to transfer a pistol person to person or require documentation from when you sold it?

  16. #16
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    Any doubts then dont sell in the first place. Or sell only to those you personally know and trust. Detailed paperwork is optional. I recommend none, then again what do I know?

  17. #17
    Senior Member Punk's Avatar

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    Quote Originally Posted by Cypher View Post
    I guess what I am trying to get at is lets say I sold two pistols and two rifles over the past 10 years, when I originally bought them I went through the background checks at the gunshop where I got them.

    Fast forward to a hopefully fictional time when a massive gun ban is made law and guns are either confiscated or forced registration. Uncle nazi comes knocking on my door asking for the the pistols and rifles (actually I don't really know if they would have that info or not just doing the standard background checks) and I tell them I sold them years ago to individuals and don't have any receipt's or documentation to show it.

    At this point is there any chance of getting in trouble legally, is there anything I should say in this situation that will help protect me or do they technically have to take me for my word since you are not required to transfer a pistol person to person or require documentation from when you sold it?
    If it came to door to door confiscation no doubt they would have rounded up all the bound books from all the FFL dealers. The bound book would have all the info, the buyer and the firearm model and serial number. They can go to manufacturers and get serial numbers for the guns and learn what wholesalers they shipped to, wholesalers have info for which retail shop they shipped to.

    A private citizen in Illinois who sells a gun is required to keep a record of the transaction for 10 years. In a more free state there is probably no requirement for non-license holders to keep records at all.
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    Senior Member Broondog's Avatar

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    in a free state, such as MO, a party may sell a firearm to another party with ABSOLUTELY no paperwork needed. no trail. no proof of the sale. no ID. no nothing, nada, zilch, zip.

    and there is nothing any agency can do about it.

    Uncle Sugar can ask all he wants but you don't have to show or prove or verify anything to him.
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