I all but halted my craigslist selling as we just moved into our new house. I didn't mind people coming by when I was in a condo, but I don't want people coming to my house especially since my pregnant wife is home more than I am. With all the no show/flakers I wouldn't meet up to sell something either. Being in Northwest Indiana I end up with people traveling from Gary to pick up items, had a lady with a tattoo on her forehead, people who I feel guilty taking money from and too many people wanting to talk for hours.
Long Craigslist story:
I was also traveling to property I inherited to sell vehicles, farm equipment and other crap. I was selling $1,750 of corrugated metal sheets to side/roof a barn. I had a guy call me tell me he was very interested but couldn't come for a couple weeks, wanted "his girl" to meet me downtown Chicago where I work to give me the money so I could hold it for him. I told him it was good, that I would hold it for him and we could meet down there in a couple weeks and he could just pay me then.
He shows up in a tricked out Escalade pulling a trailer, looked and talked like a (wannabe?) gangster, he was only in his 30's but walked with a cane and looked like he was going to collapse at any time, I forget the story but he was shot or something and showed me some scars and stuff. He gave me the cash right away so I figured let’s get this loaded so I can be on my way. He brought a cousin to help with the loading, so we load up the sheets from one location and then go to a large pole barn where the bulk of the sheets were. All the while the guy is talking about how he sleeps with a gun under his pillow and doesn't go anywhere without it, pulling out weed to smoke and asking if I wanted a hit...
So me and the cousin start loading the stuff from the barn and the guy asks if I was selling anything else (the barn was cluttered with tools and other crap), I say when I have time I'll sort through things and sell most everything. He asked if he could look around, and would ask if I would sell "x item", and I would say yeah, he loaded up a dozen or so containers full of tools and stuff and after we had the sheets loaded and he had assembled these other items he asks how much I wanted for all the stuff he collected. Since I already had gotten a good price from him on the metal sheets I tell him that I'd take $500 for all the other stuff he has taken. He tells me that he will give me $200. I tell him there is no way I could do that and start to look through the items he has in there and show him that just in one or two containers there is a few hundred dollars of stuff. He said that he already gave me the rest of the money he has and that he only has $200 so I flat tell him no way. He starts to get belligerent and is going on about how he just did all the work for me by collecting up the valuable items... At this point things are not looking good and we are in the middle of nowhere and I have about $4500 cash on me from this sale and the ones earlier that morning. I tell him that if he wants to pay $200 I would have to take stuff back and start to pull items from what he has gathered and then say for $200 you can have that. He bitches some more and said I took back all the items that he really wanted, calling me all kinds of names. Finally he says that he would give me $400 for all the stuff he originally collected, I laughed and said what about only having $200 and he snared back that his cousin has some money. I pulled out a ncaa football that I told him I wouldn't sell but I'd take the $400 for the rest as I didn't see another good ending to the situation. He bitched that he wanted it for his son and I let him know I would grab another football from the house but that that one was worth more to me and would not include it. He agrees and we load up the rest of the items.
I grab the football and a car jack we discussed earlier, he asked if there was more stuff in the house he could look at, I told him I was late for an appointment and didn’t have the time to hang out any longer. He leaves and I lock up and head home and consider my lesson learned. I get a phone call from him about an hour later and he asked if I saw stuff from his load on the road, I let him know that I headed the opposite direction so I wouldn’t have seen anything but ask why. He said a truck waved him down on the expressway and let him know that he was losing the metal sheets and other things were flying out. I tell him that sucks and add that I wasn’t involved in the securing of the items. He continues on and says he ruined his $2,000 rims driving over a curb to turn around. I tell him that it sucks and I hope he is able to get anything that flew off and get off the phone. I thought he called again, but looking back at emails he didn't call, he sent this:
"ant we made it home, thanks to god.. we did loose a few thing's but i guess the guy's that picked it up had to earn something,, lol.... i also wannna come back out nextweek to pick up a few thing's u didnt put back on the trailor, and im also gonna give u an extra 50 dollar's for the stuff as im looking at some of it and u did give me a deal, we got alot of ---steaming pile of meadow muffin---... so i guess ill see u nextweek, that's if u want me coming out... i should of bought the tiller, so dont sell it. that and the red little tool box we forgot, and a bag of little stuff i believe was with those lights u took off, a bunch of little stuff in pack's for the car, lighter's, fuses, etc.. talk to ya later...Danny"
I replied back telling him I wouldn't be around and that we can call it all even.
I am guessing that he made up all the crap about the sheets sliding out and his vehicle damage but if he was flying down the interstate I don’t think he strapped down the back edges of the sheets so who knows.
Usually the types of items you sell dictate the type of people that would be purchasing them, but this was not the case.