Comments on: Craig’s List: Flakes, Scammers, and Ho’s

By: Rex

Rex — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 12:38:00 +0000

Hah! That website is such a laugh riot. Ok, I just wasted an hour reading the stuff on that site – curses!

By: Mike

Mike — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 10:12:02 +0000

For me, I think the 80/20 rule applies: 80% of the people who contact me are flakes, the rest actually show up and usually buy. Sites like http://www.dontevenreply.com go to show this is just a sick game for people.

By: jamie

jamie — Sat, 10 Apr 2010 19:52:23 +0000

I’m glad it’s not just me. I can’t believe how disrespectful and rude people are. I’ve held things for people despite other buyers inquiring about my items, and then they don’t bother to show. I think I’ll just say first come, first serve. No appointments. If you can pick it up first, it’s yours. I’ve had 2 flakes today and 2 more during the week. It’s so annoying! I made the mistake of telling them how to get to my house. I guess it wasn’t the safest idea. I didn’t tell them which apartment though. From now on, I’m just going to have them call when they’re on their way, and then I’ll give directions. Maybe that will reduce the number of flakes? It’s so tempting to send them a nastygram, but they all have my address! Ha.

By: Mike

Mike — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 04:21:13 +0000

Just had the whole “craigslist flake” happen to me tonight. I was trying to give away a free couch rather than putting it by the curb for the scavengers. I received 6 emails in a little over a day.

Examples:

1)Hello, saw the ad , please let me know if this is still avaliable …. i can pick it up after work about 5pm? Please let me know thanks

2)Still available? Where at in —?

3)int in sofa call —- thank u

4)Hello,
Is your couch still available?? If so, I am interested and willing to pick it up asap.

5)WHere Are you loCated? call ——
Thanks in advance

This is the first time I have used craigslist, so I responded to each of these by listing my cell number telling them to call to arrange a time.

Out of the five above, I received 3 no calls, 1 hang up in my face, and one waiting game that ruined my evening. I call the guy, he says he’s interested, sets up a time, asks directions to the area and will call for specific directions when he gets close. He no shows, I call, he calls back and says he is still coming. An hour and a half goes by…nothing. What I don’t understand is why he called back if he wasn’t coming – he could have flaked after my first call.

I don’t get why people do this. Are they for real or are they playing some kind of game. “I’ll come get it ASAP” only to no-show. I guess I’ll go back to the Recycler from now on. You can’t even give away free stuff!!

By: FlakeMaster

FlakeMaster — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 20:14:05 +0000

Consult the FlakeList to help you avoid flakes! Or you can submit your own and help others from getting flaked too.

By: Janna

Janna — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 17:15:43 +0000

Great post! I agree with Kelley that Craig’s List is a hit or miss endeavor. I guess you just had more than your fair share of bad luck. I listed several items when my family was preparing to move, and we were able to sell 90% of them within 2-3 days. We did have a few semi-flakes who called about my husband’s motorcycle; they wanted us to drop the already low price, or deliver it to them, etc. But we also got 10-12 serious callers. Within 4 hours of listing, the bike was carted off to a new home for our asking price.

Sorry your experience was such a negative one. If you ever want to see humanity at its lowest common denominator, take a look at their ‘Rants’ section. *shiver*

By: Tim Tate

Tim Tate — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 18:22:14 +0000

I’ve had decent luck with Craigslist as both a buyer and a seller. One key to screening flakes is a “no holds” policy. Tell them “first person to show up at my house with money in their hand gets it – NO EXCEPTIONS”. This accomplishes a couple of things: it lets you stop worrying about whether someone’s going to show up on time or not, and it motivates the buyer to get to you as quickly as possible so they don’t miss out.

By: Kelley Mitchell

Kelley Mitchell — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 21:38:36 +0000

Great post! I sold a minivan on Craigslist. The first response I got was someone wanting to trade me their souped-up dune buggy for my $5,000 Town & Country. But I did sell the van very quickly to a nice couple.

My carpenter husband often looks for power tools on Craigslist and comes across ones that are dirt cheap and can only suppose that they are stolen.

It’s just hit or miss I guess.

By: shris

shris — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 17:37:27 +0000

Hi.

We have had amazing good luck with Craigslist. We have never had a flake. We have sold an oak desk ($250, though it took months of reposts), purchased a china cabinet, a large home office desk with rolling file cabinet, some cabinets for the garage, and a cheap kids’ dresser, given away some fencing, purchased lawn equipment, sold lawn equipment, and a whole bunch of other bits and bobs that we needed to get rid of.

We love Craigslist. Of course, we are near a major metropolitan area, so there’s not only a great deal of variety in offerings, there’s a huge number of buyers, too. The buyers don’t mess around because they know there’s a hundred more right behind them. In fact, for decent items cheap, we usually get a call within an hour and a pickup the same day–usually with cash in hand and often no quibbling on price. When we list items for free, they’re often gone within an hour of listing (on a weekend afternoon).

For clothes, I donate to Goodwill. I might take my books there too if I can’t sell them on Craigslist or if I don’t need credits on paperbackswap. But everything else has a market on Craigslist and we love it to pieces.

Sorry you haven’t had the same good fortune–I do see posts on Craigslist that warn buyers about this or that bad behavior that won’t be acceptable, but I haven’t had to do that for any of our listings.

shris