How wary are you of buying/selling stuff off of Craigslist? Do you ever worry about meeting up with an absolute stranger for the sale?

For every story like that, there are hundreds/thousands that go perfectly. I, myself, have done at least 2 dozen craigslist transactions. Never a problem, never a danger.

The key is to meet in a public, well-trafficked place, and don’t do stupid things. Like don’t go alone if you’re selling a vehicle.

I just wouldn’t meet at either parties house.
I’m pretty comfortable meeting at a public area where there will be others around.

As said, meeting in public is key. Preferably not alone.

I sold some stereo components to a guy. He met me at work and a coworker was with me at my car.

I do Craigslist all the time. Only once did we have them come to our place. It was in an apartment complex, broad daylight, and we had friends there. Also my hubby is huge. Usually it’s a “Let’s meet in the Walmart parking lot” thing.

@Mama_Cakes That’s a heartbreaking story. I would base it on the value of what I’m selling. The more value the more precautions I would take. You never know for sure, so probably in public with someone with me.

This story is even scarier.

@genjgal both stories are equally sad.

Is Craigslist really much different from newspaper classified ads? The medium may have changed, but the rules have always been the same—don’t invite a stranger to your home; meet someone in a busy, public area; if you feel uneasy, bring along a friends, etc.

I know someone who just got an apartment and got some decent stuff from Craigslist. He got a really nice condition couch, loveseat and ottoman for $300 and 3 piece bedroom set – headboard, bureau, nightstand for $100.

I’m a regular Craigslist seller, and I’ve never met a buyer who was anything but nice—and often, very interesting. This is not to say I’m not cautious. I always arrange to meet a buyer in a very public place during daylight hours, for mutual peace of mind.

I agree with @elbanditoroso

I have bought and sold tons of things on C’sList over the years and have never had a problem.
When I moved from my home a few months ago I ran an ad for “Huge, beautiful, decorative potted plants” and a woman showed up first thing and bought over $400 of my plants.
I have also gone to peoples homes and met people in public places without a problem.
I had about 6 people come to my moving sale and buy all sorts of furniture and artwork, etc. no issues whatsoever and everyone was very nice.

Now if one was to be foolish enough to meet with somebody via the super sleaze side of C’sList….“casual encounters” etc. well….you deserve to have your head chopped off and put in the freezer as a trophy. lolol

I’ve used it a few times; I have friends who have used it a lot. We’ve never encountered anyone weird or dangerous – just real people like us.

And yeah, as others have said, just use whatever precautions you might for dealing with strangers.

My husband and I have used it a few times, no problems at all. If my husband wasn’t around, I would insist on meeting a person in public though, better safe than sorry.

We wanted to sell a couple beds before we moved and someone suggested craigslist. We had never sold or bought anything on there before. I think I have been on the website three times for 20 minutes. Anyway, we waited until my husband was back home (he had gone ahead of me to start work, but came home to actually move out of our house) because we didn’t feel comfortable having me alone take the calls and receive a potential buyer at the house. We sold the beds in about 30 minutes! It was crazy. We could not believe how fast. 5 calls came in one after another, we sold it to the first guy.

Things like this, the problem is when they go wrong, they can go very wrong. The majority of the time it’s all good.

It’s like when I was a realtor. You have an open house or agree to meet a client, and you can turn up robbed, raped or dead.

I’ve never had any issues with Criagslist meetings because I always meet in very public places like others have said. I have had some encounters with crazy people though, but that’s part of the fun of craigslist for me :P

The funniest experience I had was this one time I was buying a pump for my fish tank. I had called the guy earlier that day and arranged a meeting time/place at a walmart or something like that.(I had also really wanted to get this done on this day because I was an hour away at a friends house which was close to the seller.) So about 30 minutes before meeting the guy calls me back and says “I’m sorry but I have to go into work today. We can just do this another day”

I told him no big deal I’ll just come meet you at work just give me directions. So he gives me directions of how to get there but never actually mentions the name of the place. Just says it’s by a wawa and there is a mcdonalds across the street and some other landmarks. So I drive over and where does he work? A super super hardcore porn store :P And that was when I realized I now had to walk into the porn store and ask to buy a pump off him…..

People must use good sense when arranging to meet strangers. Choose a public place and never go alone. Use good sense. If something seems too good to be true, then it probably is!

A lot of it depends on trust.
I would never try to buy something of value unless I was sure of authenticity.
And I am pretty sure this guy is selling the REAL Angelina Jolie boobs.

That can happen anywhere, whether it’s via Craigslist or not. I agree with @Dr_Lawrence you do have to use good sense in any situation like that where you’re buying something from a stranger or going to someone’s house that you don’t know, etc. My Craigslist experiences have been purely fantastic. I have never been murdered. I use Craigslist more than almost anyone I know, too. So.

I’ve sold a few things on Craigslist and most of the time I had someone else come with me to meet the buyer in a public location. A few months ago I was selling an iPhone 3G for $50 and I didn’t have anyone available to go with me so I met him at a local college campus in the parking lot, when I got there I didn’t have any other $ on me and he only had a $100, he just told me to keep the change, I told him I would wait if he wanted to go get change instead, but he said to just keep it. At the time I was thinking “I either just came up an extra $50 or thins guy just burned me with a fake $100 bill”.....lol, I checked it when I got home and it was legit. I was really stoked because I desperately needed the extra money to pay off my traffic ticket (which was incidentally why I was selling the phone so cheap).

Craigslist is the toilet of the Internet. I’m certainly not afraid of it, but I find 90% of the time the people on it are complete flakes, and often about as dumb as the crowd the haunts Yahoo Answers.

I mainly use it for giving away stuff I don’t want. I can’t actually count on its cretinous userbase to be forthcoming about completing a transaction. I even have trouble there.

I’ve used it hundreds of times and never had anything even sort of weird happen. When I had to leave and find another place to live, I found a room in a house in like 5 minutes and my room mate was just great.

I also love to tell the story about how I met my bestie on Craigslist. I was looking to start babysitting co-op, she had advertised for taking in a child for daycare.

She had posted a picture of herself, her husband, and their son. They just looked like nice people.

I responded to her ad, basically “i don’t need child care, but maybe our babies can play together.” She responded, “We have passes to the zoo. Let’s meet tomorrow morning.”

She and I, and our kids, have been inseparable ever since.

@Seek_Kolinahr I love everything about that story.

Be careful! Craigslist killers…?