He is going to "give" it to you but he will want the money back?
This is what the ATF calls a Straw Purchase and it is illegal.
I agree with you to a point. We both agree on the Straw Purchaser.
The intent would even lean toward a Straw Purchase.
Yet how many times has someone offered to give you something you did not feel right about just taking so you gave them a few dollars for it or for their trouble. I see it in the legal profession often. Even the SCOTUS does not agree 100% on what the law means or how to interpret it.
I will say this, I refuse to do anything illegal. PERIOD. Shady, maybe but not illegal. Example: I know the cousin could give me a gun by passing it on to me. Totally legal. Later he may fall upon hard times and I let him have $500, again, totally legal. Looking back on it, I may let him have the $500 simply because he was nice enough to let me have the gun first. The way I read the rules, that would be a totally innocent event and not buying a gun from him.
Now to say this, he tells me gun sales at this show are often between individuals and no paperwork is done. THIS scares me. I do not want a stolen gun. So I will not buy one like that. While I have bought guns from individuals, I always run the serial numbers before I buy and these have always been local transactions. I do not have any connections in GA LE to run the numbers.