So I advertised a lathe on CL and.......

[ken carroll]

I advertised my old King Seeley wood lathe on Craigslist for $75 and got this reply today from "GS"

"You still have it up for sale?"

I replied "Yes, still for sale"

and got this from "Greg M"

"Hi,

Am glad it's available. I'm going on a business trip to London but I will instruct my assistant to prepare and mail your payment which I'm sure you will get in about 5 - 7 business days. I'll add $30 extra for the delay. I can only pay via money order as am going on a business trip now so send me your info (i.e full name, mailing address and your phone number) so payment can be mailed out immediately. I will also make arrangement for pick-up which will be after you must have received and cashed the payment. Awaiting your info.
Thanks"



You have got to be kidding me! A scam for a $75 lathe? Are times that tough that someone would try to scam me out of a $75 lathe?

Groan.......

[Matt Meiser]

Your first mistake was responding to the initial question ;)

[Chris Merriam]

I know Matt is just joking, but you should take his advice. The moment you respond to one of those emails the bad guys have your email address. I learned my lesson a few months ago. I was excited to sell and told the person the item is still available, then within 10 minutes I get a phishing email where they pretended to be craiglist admin trying to get my password.

My new rule is, I won't even respond unless they mention something specific about my product or my hometown. For example, I'll ignore "Is it still for sale?", but I will respond to "Hey, I'm just down the road from you, is your saw still available?"

[James Baker SD]

Wow, that is almost word for word the same message I got when I posted a Delta Shaper on Craig's list a month ago. I started a thread on that in the off topic forum. Could not figure out what their angle was, but knew it had to be crooked somehow.

[Stephen Cherry]

The first thing with craigslist is to set up a separate "junk" email account to screen out all the scammers. No sense giving them your normal email address.

Next, you may put in the add, "Please respond with full name, town, and telephone number." If someone wants the machine, they will let you know who they are.

"Still have it?" is just a game, so why waist any time or emotion on it. I'm not a big seller, but I think with a little experience you can spot a scammer very quickly.

Also, a quick search on "intelius" or "whitepages" will let you know if the person exists.

[Geoff Barry]

Ha! I recently posted lathe parts, an air conditioner, and a pull-up tower on CL, and within a few hours, had ientical emails for all three -- "Is your item still available? I hope it is clean. Please let me know." I only respond to emails that ask me something specific about what's for sale . .

[glenn bradley]

Only $75 but, 1000 scams for $75 out of that online scam-factory and you're talking decent money ;-)

[Carl Beckett]

This is worth considering as a BUYER also. When I respond to an add with short one liner questions and no identifiable information, I dont get good responses back (and am often ignored)

If I have a clear name, and phone number (many people still will only talk over the phone - which I avoid due to geekiness), and some specific questions that show that I am serious about purchasing the item if it pans out to be what I want - I get great response.

[Mike Goetzke]

I get this on everything I list there. Like others suggest - tell them to list the item you are selling in their response. Some sellers have gone as far as telling potential buyer to leave a phone number.

I have a better CL story. I was selling a somewhat expensive dining room set. I started getting spam mail with pictures of hot young women offering their goods as barder for the furniture.


Mike

[Carl Beckett]

I have a better CL story. I was selling a somewhat expensive dining room set. I started getting spam mail with pictures of hot young women offering their goods as barder for the furniture.


The question is then..... do you still have the furniture? :D

[Kyle Iwamoto]

I started getting spam mail with pictures of hot young women offering their goods as barder for the furniture.


Well, seeing as they did mention the furniture, seems legit to me.....

[Kevin Bourque]

I forget what it was I was selling, but I got scam E-mails like yours for weeks , even after I deleted the ad !!!

[Anthony Diodati]

Yeah, or tell them to but something in the subject line, like Lathe in Moundsville, I live in Wheeling,
Some people will say send your number, I won't reply with out Phone #



I know Matt is just joking, but you should take his advice. The moment you respond to one of those emails the bad guys have your email address. I learned my lesson a few months ago. I was excited to sell and told the person the item is still available, then within 10 minutes I get a phishing email where they pretended to be craiglist admin trying to get my password.

My new rule is, I won't even respond unless they mention something specific about my product or my hometown. For example, I'll ignore "Is it still for sale?", but I will respond to "Hey, I'm just down the road from you, is your saw still available?"

[Mike Goetzke]

The question is then..... do you still have the furniture? :D

I was wondering how the wife would take it if I told her the good news is the furniture is gone the bad news is.....

(actually I almost cried but my wife had me paint the set and her and my daughter distressed/aged them - doesn't look too bad)

[Jim Marshall]

I wish I had read this thread before I replied to an ad for a hand plane on CL, I asked the question "do you still have the plane", now I see why I didn't hear back from the guy, I missed out on a #8 Stanley because of that. Thanks for the heads up.

[Kevin W Johnson]

I don't give my phone number when I first reply to an ad. I do however make my response more than a one liner, and do give my location and suggest a local meeting place for inspection by name. I also look at the email address of the person that replied when I'm selling something. It's safe to say that business domains, and .edu addresses are legit, at least that's been my experience. Most of the trash comes from yahoo and gmail emails..... another reason I give a lot of info when I reply to an ad using a gmail email.

I also use a gmail account for anything CL related. Easy to dump and create a new one if needed. So far it seems as though the spammers don't even add gmail emails to their lists, as I've never gotten any junk even after taunting the spammers/scammers.

[Dan Hintz]

So far it seems as though the spammers don't even add gmail emails to their lists, as I've never gotten any junk even after taunting the spammers/scammers.
Google is top notch about filtering before anything bad hits your inbox... I've only had one false positive on their spam filter in the many years I've been using them. Very few false negatives, as in I could likely count them on one hand...

[Peter Hawser]

When my personal assistant read me this thread, I was quite shocked! Seriously, what a bizarre world. I hope they go away quickly.