My Adventures with Craigslist

Ruchi wrote about her adventure with buying a kitchen cart off craigslist. I've also been having craigslist adventures but from the other end: as the one with the goods. In Ruchi's case, she and her boyfriend had to figure out, after the fact, how to get a kitchen cart home when it didn't fit in their car. I guarantee that if someone here had bought that cart from me, they would have been knocking on my door the minute they knew it wouldn't fit, begging for me to somehow take responsibility and fix the situation. They might even want to renege on the sale, get their money back, and even ask for compensation for mileage for the drive. (Seriously.) No problem solvers here, it seems.

I've added a note to some of my postings for the people who aren't paying attention: "Note that I am way north of town and I will not deliver this item." I'm tired of talking to them and having them whine about the long drive. If you didn't want to make the drive, you should've just passed on the item in the first place. Depending on my time, I am sometimes willing to meet people in town when I go to the CSA. In fact, I try to time my postings to craigslist so that I can get everything set up to do that, without them having to wait more than a day or two to meet me. But, I don't always have time to do that, and some things don't fare well sitting in a hot vehicle for hours.

After having much of yesterday sucked up with back and forth email, too, I'm ready to add: "If you don't put your phone number in your email, your email will be deleted. I don't have time to email back and forth with you fifteen times to tell you the condition (which was well described in the post), the model number (usually included in the post), how far it is to my location (Hello? Google maps), and basically hold your hand through the entire process of you getting something at a fraction of the cost. You're an adult; act like one."

'Course I don't do that because, sigh, we need to get rid of this stuff and we can't be picky in a bad economy. Yard sales are a whole heck of a lot of work, but it might be easier in the long run because everyone would come at once instead of dealing with multiple people for every item. On the other hand, petty theft is on the rise, it seems, at yard sales so that adds a level of frustration to that route. I need to recruit a friend or two to help when we do have the yard sale.

One guy's email made me laugh this week. On a few items, we've put a price and OBO. I hate opening that door but the tough economic times are causing the used market to be flooded with sellers and relatively few buyers. My sweetie's theory is that many people simply do not have cash - any cash - to buy from craigslist, so they end up buying something new, for a lot higher price, because they can use credit to do that. So, when this guy responded to my OBO posting with $30 CASH, it made me laugh. Of course it's going to be cash. Does he really think I'm accepting offers on credit?

I would possibly, however, barter at this point for help cleaning up the yard. There are many weeds and brush piles to clean up, and our time always seems too stretched to get to that. My neighbor keeps telling me that it's okay to put the brush in the wash to help with erosion. I've searched the county's website, though, and can find no mention of this one way or another. I know construction debris is banned and they have made people remove dumped inert materials even if it helped slow bank erosion. I don't want to take the risk that they will get on our case for something else after spending a lot of time and effort lining the banks with cut brush. So it's got to be hauled off.

Even though every craigslist experience does not go smooth as silk, overall the process is far easier than the old days of having to place, in person, an ad in the newspaper. And we have met some nice folks occasionally. Best of all, we get to see our things that are dusty from lack of use heading off to a new home where they will be pampered and loved as a new toy again.