Craigslist

Craigslisters are, on average, less intelligent, less polite, and less punctual than eBayers. That has been my finding.

You have to remember that with completely free ads, it costs someone nothing to post one or to respond to one. He can toss off an email in 30 seconds which is as close to free as I can think of. I get a whole lot of people who query "Is this still available?" and then never respond when I say yes. You could wonder why they waste their time and yours, but the truth is the item has slightly caught their interest but isn't nearly compelling enough for them to really do anything.

If that guy needed your wheels and tires he would have broken the speed records getting to your house, and showed up with cash. That's the kind of buyer you troll for on craigslist.

The thing is just to accept things the way they are and not get upset about it.

Sometimes as a buyer when I perceive desperation on the part of the seller, I ask them to deliver an item, or meet me partway. Sometimes it even works out. But then I rarely respond unless I'm genuinely interested in something.

Grant

I've bought a few things from Craigslist. And I would NEVER do that to a seller: "diddle" the price or expect a seller to deliver for nothing.

Frankly, I was astounded when you offered to deliver my welder for nothing!

I had only 1 bad experience with a Craigslist seller and several good ones. The bad experience involved a container load of tools. The seller sounded desperate - willing to unload his container lot by the pound at scrap prices. When I tried to set up a meeting to see what he had, the guy got VERY strange and told me he needed to check the location once again and would call me back in a couple of hours. He never did.

I have to assume that the stuff was stolen.

All in all, I prefer the eBay model over Cragslist but I will continue to look both places.

Gary

Not knowing whether or not Gunner did to begin with, be sure to post specifically where you are (what town, neighborhood if it's a city, or which end of what county if the town is too precise for your paranoia). This both filters out the people at the wrong end of the catchbasin who don't want to drive that far and can admit that to themselves without bothering you, and causes real buyers to pay more attention to your ad (as a lot of the spam/phishing crap that makes it onto craigslist tends to have either no location, or a "location" which is the same as the name of the particular list).

As a buyer, I find craigslist a LOT better than ebay, as I can go look at the stuff, and do a cash-on-the-barrelhead transaction. I will occasionally inquire where something is if it's sufficiently interesting (and not mentioned), but if it's too far to drive (my time trumps the gas money for that factor) I won't bother (nor will I ask the seller to deliver - since people who ask for delivery are likely to be scammers anyway). OTOH, if it's something I want that's in range, I'm there with cash ASAP.

Not my experience. I just sold a nice lathe and a nice antique tractor on the DFW Craiglist. Inquiries were numerous and pleasant, both items sold fairly promptly. Made a few new friends too.

And I've bought a bunch of stuff on CL in the last year. Mostly firearms, despite the *cough* ban. Pretty amusing some of the ways people get around that.

"Paper Puncher for sale. Makes holes approx .223 diamter. black."

Good for you, my experience has been different, though I do not mind Craigslisters as buyers -- only reporting what I learned.

Very funny and creative. Tangentially, maybe it is time for me to look into .223 paper punchers, which I avoided to date, for reasons that may not apply any more (more money).

I have a Ruger Mini-14 .223" paper punch for sale.

Yep! My dad had a saying. "Is the corn shelled" It was supposed to been the reply to a farmer who offered some corn to a down and out (peter tumbeldown) neighbor. Some people are verry hard to please. :-) ...lew...

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I had a catch filled in on my Mini14 paper punch so it would punch automatically. The one time I had two legged varmints in the sales building, I punched 30 holes in about five seconds. The varmints scattered real fast, so hole punches make good varmint repellent also.

Karl

Anyone have a Browning BAR 7mm R.M. masonry drill for sale cheap?

I have a steel punch in this size, however it is not for sale.

I guess you aren't familiar with Browning tools...

Mine is not Browning. Yes, indeed I am not familiar. if I recall correctly, mine is a Mossberg.

Ah. Check them out some time, very nice piece of metalworking.

The build-it-yourself AR hobby is a pretty big deal. Buy a piece at a time if you are a bargain hunter. mix and match components for an infinite number of variations. For extra credit (and metalworking content), buy a forged blank lower for $25 and mill it into a receiver. Much fun to be had.

CL has been great in my experience (both buying and selling). I prefer it over EBAY.

Here is an amusing post that is also related to this NG:

/Enjoy,

AG

When I picked up my bridgeport this april, I looked into the scrap dumpsters at the seller. Tons of scrap AR upper and lower forgings along with trigicon? scope housings. I should have asked for a few but I figured they wouldn't give me any. Still... Something to add to my list of regrets.

Wes

ROTFLMAO. It is rather funny, though, I imagine, not to the person whose house was stripped.

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany