I like the idea of a site I am looking at on Flippa, but just don't want to get scammed. The seller has posted sitemeter traffic for last year and there has been a big jump since January, which maybe is a red flag. Given the red flags I think the site is going to sell for a lot less than it otherwise could so I still have some interest. I am hoping for a small fee someone with some expertise could take a look for me. Please PM me for URL.
Do your research.. track down whois, check to see if the content is original, check out any contact info you get from whois to see who the seller really is. Use web.archive.org to check the sites history. check how many back links to the site and where they're coming from. ask for access to google analaytics/webmastertools. Check seller profile for any previous sales and contact the buyer, ask him how the sale went etc. If you're happy with all the info then you've done your homework, if he scams you by not giving you the domain/files etc you cannot do anything about it.
Per advice I went web.archive.org to check the sites history, and there is something strange. The site looked quite a bit different all the way to March of this year. It almost doesn't make sense but it raises a flag to ask the seller about, so thank you for the idea Solid_Nuts!