Craigslist experiment backfired! 

"E92M3" (E46M3) 10/08/2018 at 00:49 • Filed to: WTF!

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So I listed my deceased father’s 89 Crown Vic on Craigslist Friday. If you’ve ever sold anything on craigslist (especially a cheap car), you can imagine the bizzaro nonsense I’ve dealt with all weekend. I listed the car for $1100, but was expecting to get $800. I was offered trades ranging from a 1960's Egyptian Hakim Military rifle, to 80's motorcycles that had seen better days. Of course there were random calls with a million questions, that ended with a thanks and hanging up. Texts requesting more pics, and then no response. There were 2 no shows. Last but not least (and my most hated approach), were the 3 or 4“I got $500" texts. Now I’ve convinced myself up until today that serious buyers call you, they have questions, they may even ask if you are negotiable at all. But they never throw out a number (not even a lowball offer) without even asking at least ONE question, and not before seeing and test driving the car. Around 3 pm I get a text from a guy ”I got $700" (oh boy this is the best offer yet). At this point I’m exhausted, and I decide I want to see what happens when someone finally says “ok you got a deal” for the first time after who knows how many people told them to fuck off in the past. Just to spice it up I reply with “ok, you got a deal. But you HAVE to get it tonight, and I want it all in $20 bills. This offer expires at midnight tonight”. 30 mins goes by and no reply. Just as I expected, he never thought about the possibility of the offer being accepted, and has no intention of actually buying anything. Probably doesn’t even have $700 in cash. My first thought would of been “why would he a ccept such a ridicul ous offer, must be something seriously wrong with it". But then a few mins later he asks for my address. So I give it to him. I’ve played out this scenario in my mind many times in the past. My intention was to give them a real address, just not my address. To let them waste their time driving across town, because they’ve wasted so many other peoples time. I wasn’t even home, but I could of been home in 30 mins if he said he was on the way. I never hear from him again. Was he just testing me to see if I was messing with him? He probably thought I wouldn’t reply. He never replied saying he’s heading this way or to setup a time. By 8:30 I’m certain he was just as usual, nothing but a waste of time. By this time I’ve since talked to 2 more people on the phone and setup times for them to see the car tomorrow. I’m thinking that’s good, maybe one of them will actually show up and buy it. At 10:00 pm my doorbell rings. WTF? Who could it be? SIX hours after giving him my address, and no response the guy is now at my house. Who shows up to a strangers house at 10pm without even saying anything, asking if it’s too late, or without knowing if the person is even at home. It’s been 6 hours hours, someone else could of already came, bought the car, and be home with that much time passing. This is sketchy as hell, but what the heck. He looks at the car for literally 2 mins, starts the engine but does no test drive, hands me the cash in all 20's just like I asked, I sign the title and he drives off. So much for calling his bluff, I could of probably got that $800, but I’m just glad to see it gone.

atfsgeoff > E92M3 10/08/2018 at 01:57

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Yeah craigslist is full of odd fellas. Unfortunately the anonymity works against credibility of both buyer and seller. But just like how a broken clock is right twice a day, occasionally you can get a gem despite all red flags to the contrary.

Manwich - now Keto-Friendly > E92M3 10/08/2018 at 02:04

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Yeah... I go through the same type of thing when renting out property. Only thing is, where I live, there is high demand but limited supply.

So I have no problem finding someone who is serious. But even in this situation, you get idiots who don’t read or don’t do their homework and who think I should cut my reasonable asking price just because they are in a rush .

Tristan > E92M3 10/08/2018 at 02:16

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From your previous post, that looks like it was one hell of a clean car. I’ve got a major soft spot for those, too. My wife is glad I didn’t know you were selling it for that cheap.

E92M3 > Tristan 10/08/2018 at 03:12

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I had it l isted for $1200 for a couple weeks, months ago, with no serious offers . Then my sister made the mistake of mentioning it to the lawyer, and it was tied up in probate for 2+ months. Realistically it was a $1000 car, if you could wait for the right buyer. I was just tired of playing musical cars, and even more  tired of craigsli sters.

Future Heap Owner > E92M3 10/08/2018 at 03:15

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I love hearing these craigslist seller reports, as someone who’s  gonna have to do that eventually.

E92M3 > Manwich - now Keto-Friendly 10/08/2018 at 03:19

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Funny you mention that, I’m about to list a rental house tomorrow and the thought of feilding phone calls for both at the same time were overwhelming me. No one reads, my listing will specifically say “agents don’t waste your time, i’m not looking to sell and I’m not paying for your help to find a tenant”. I’ll get 10 calls from agents by Friday. 

Tristan > E92M3 10/08/2018 at 03:41

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That’s what’s stopping me from listing my Suburban... I like the truck, and I hate Craigslisters.

InFierority Complex > E92M3 10/08/2018 at 04:20

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I’d go for the Hakim, actually. They’re a license built Swedish design. Pretty cool.

jimz > E92M3 10/08/2018 at 06:13

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Last but not least (and my most hated approach), were the 3 or 4“I got $500" texts.

Reply “I do too, so... thanks?”

boxrocket > Tristan 10/08/2018 at 06:29

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There’s probably a suburban enthusiast/owner forum you could post it on. And of course there’s CarMax but while you won’t get the most value for i t, sometimes the lack of hassle is worth it.

TheRealBicycleBuck > E92M3 10/08/2018 at 07:20

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I believe I would get the name and number of every one of those agents, then tell them about the wonderful online review they are about to receive.

I had an engineer screw me on a foundation inspection. I didn’t even hire the bastard, the buyers did. But their financing hinged on his report which he wouldn’t release unless I paid him an additional $800. I refused to pay it, so my agent did (without my permission). Instead, I reported him.

TheRealBicycleBuck > E92M3 10/08/2018 at 07:29

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“Then my sister made the mistake of mentioning it to the lawyer, and it was tied up in probate for 2+ months.”

 My mom’s bank got wind of her passing and tied up her bank accounts for six months despite me being the only heir, there being a will in place, and two separate letters from our lawyer. I finally accused them of practicing law without a license (they were) and threatened to take them to court. They released the funds that afternoon.

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > E92M3 10/08/2018 at 08:53

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a 1960's Egyptian Hakim Military rifle

That is a hell of an offbeat trade. I didn’t know what that was, but I checked GunBroker, and apparently that could easily be a $700-$800+ gun, so it’s not as insane as it comes across. Weird, yes. Insane or insulting, not necessarily.

It’s basically an Egyptian-made Swedish gun chambered in Mauser sizes.

Akio Ohtori - RIP Oppo > E92M3 10/08/2018 at 10:35

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Congrats!  That is effing weird but at least it is gone.

On overpriced stuff with otherwise acceptable ads I have been known to throw out a number and see what happens. I’ve never had someone say “yes” but if they had I would have bought it for the agreed upon price if it was approximately as advertised.

E92M3 > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht 10/08/2018 at 11:03

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I also checked gunbroker.com, but the few that were on there had a starting bid of $700-800 with no bids. IIRC there was only one with bids, that was going for around $500. I checked on a forum trying to find out what kind of ammo they use, and the cost of the ammo. They seem to have a lot of issues with loading from the mag, and if you don’t have an intimate understanding of these guns it’s easy to accidentally fire a round before it’s loaded all the way. The gurus were scolding a guy for even trying to test loading at his house. In the end I thought it would be a harder sell than a cheap car. 

Tristan > boxrocket 10/08/2018 at 11:07

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I’ve never one had luck posting a car for sale on a forum. The biggest problem with doing so is the majority of people reading the classifieds there already own one.

E92M3 > Akio Ohtori - RIP Oppo 10/08/2018 at 11:17

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I get these with everything I’ve sold on there, and I usually don’t even respond. Because I imagine they’ll either not show up, or they will try to get the price down even further in person. This was close enough to my bottom dollar that I said what the hell, I want to see what happens. Never imagined he would ACTUALLY show up. After 3 or 4 hours of no response I was 100% certain. I guess h e was   busy getting those 35- $20 bills.

E92M3 > TheRealBicycleBuck 10/08/2018 at 11:32

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We really only needed the lawyer for the house. Hard to sell a house without the deed in your name. Easy to sign the title of a car over though. It’s not like the DMV is going to analyze the hand writing. Hell, we even have the same name, I could of conveniently l eft the JR. off. I think the lawyer was just wanting to add an asset . By the time we pay the lawyer for her fee, the court for another document filing fee, and 2 months of additional insurance we probably only cleared $300-3 50. Which we’ll have to split 3 ways. Main reason I d idn’t want to waste anymore of my time on it.

If it had be a different car I wo uld of seriously considered using it as a Gambler 500 vehicle. It’s so long though , there are no approach/ departure angles. Lol

Akio Ohtori - RIP Oppo > E92M3 10/08/2018 at 11:35

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Yeah I imagine people doing that with the intent of showing up and honoring the agreement are in the minority.

E92M3 > TheRealBicycleBuck 10/08/2018 at 11:42

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That’s not a bad idea actually. I hate it, but I also understand they are taught to do all kinds of nonsense when inventory is low. Like driving around randomly and looking for unkept houses to put their flyer in.

Then there’s the ones that look for death notices, and trackdown the family hoping to be the first agent to contact them. I find that more annoying. “ Let me save us both some time, you’re the 30th agent to call this week”. 

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > E92M3 10/08/2018 at 11:45

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I thought it would be a harder sell than a cheap car.

...presumably why he was seeing if you’d take it. Liquidity has various levels, and half the use of barter is finding somebody whose reduction of opportunity cost is a mirror of your own and who has what you want . He could have gotten lucky if you’d wanted it - worth a shot, right? Win-win.

I imagine anybody who already has a Mauser boltaction might be all over that thing, but such a person is not you.

Me personally, my perverse scandi turn of the century bolt interest leans more to Krag than Swede Mauser.

TheRealBicycleBuck > E92M3 10/08/2018 at 15:59

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Selling my mom’s house was the easy part. She put everything into a trust and I was the trustee. Getting it ready for the sale was hard. Years of stuff collecting in/around the house had to be sorted through and disposed of. Years of poor maintenance led to some significant work to get it ready for sale.

If I ever get the title to her car, I’ll get it transferred, but it’s taken over 18 months so far and I’m not sure the bank will ever send me the cleared title. I may have to apply for a lost title.  

E92M3 > TheRealBicycleBuck 10/08/2018 at 20:31

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I feel extremely lucky for   the house to go thru probate in just shy of 3 months. His house was also a disaster . Almost nothing was salvage able because he smoked inside f or close to 4 0 years. W e pretty much had to trash everyth ing, except for what was in the garage. I can’t believe it’s already under contract. They’ll have to complete ly gut it.

TheRealBicycleBuck > E92M3 10/08/2018 at 21:46

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My mom didn’t smoke, but she had a lot of stuff for projects she planned to tackle when she retired. I always joked that I’d have to get a dumpster to clean out her house. I felt bad when I had to order one for real. I felt even worse when I had to order two more.

To be fair, a lot of the stuff we got rid of was outside - the pile of bricks for her future patio, the old windows and pile of wood that were to become another storage building, etc. Thank God I have a friend with a skid-steer.

After I cleaned it out, we had to go through the whole house and make repairs. I followed up by painting almost every room. It was rough.

E92M3 > TheRealBicycleBuck 10/09/2018 at 12:48

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We filled 3 dumpsters and 2 box trucks from “ we haul junk” for the heavy stuff. I tried to tell my sisters we should at least put a coat of white paint on every wall, and install some cheap carpet so it wouldn’t be so overwhelming, but they weren’t interested. I tho ught it would be $4k well spent. In the end I’m happy with the price we got for it. He happened to pass away at what is probably the peak of the housing market in this area for a long while.