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I wouldn't blame a seller for boosting the price when they find out how valuable their item is. Why not we do the same on hot property and we do a highest and best. The trouble with craigs is half the people on there are flakes.
Recently I was selling a collection of large scale trains for $250 which is a decent price. A guy contacts me about buying them all so I offer a discount of $50 bucks then he drops the bomb he wants me to deliver them more than 50 miles out of my way and he would be willing to generously give me $150. COME ON SERIOUSLY!
Everyone on Craigslist wants a deal but when I buy something and it is actually worth all the money they are asking I don't haggle.
And here we have the failing of the OP's argument because
yes the listing is the offer
The email back saying they will buy is the acceptance
but without the exchange of currency, there is no sale,
you are completely correct..
This is not true, money doesn't have to change hands in order for their to be a contract. The contract is enforceable when both parties agree to exchange consideration. Failure for one of the members of the party to DELIVER is breach of the contract.
Isn't the whole point of Craigslist to pick up deals and 'take stuff off peoples hands'? Basically an online yard sale. Prices are supposed to be super low. Great for finding a cheap end table, used car, or something to flip for profit on Ebay.
So anyone else annoyed when you find what looks like the score of the century on something (like vintage electronics or a crate of vinyl records for instance), you email the seller, and you get a response to the effect of "I got a ton of inquiries and discovered that I way underpriced this item" and then you go back and find that the price was doubled, tripled, quadrupled, or more from what it originally was.
Anyone else hate it when these guys "get wise" before you are able to make your score?
Is there any way to legally force them to honor the original listing which was in place at the time I sent an inquiry-backed with time stamped screen shot? I mean there's hundreds of dollars at stake here. If the seller f-ed up, that's HIS fault. No? I demand my score. What recourse do I have? Or since it's CL, am I just SOL? The item is now priced in line with what it goes for on Ebay. But I thought that the only place one could get away with charging Ebay prices is on...Ebay. Every place else...CL, the thrift shops, yard sales...should be priced at....CL, thrift shop, and yard sale prices. Which means around one-twentieth of Ebay.
Can anyone help? Or at lease share your own stories of missed scores.
Only if it can be legally enforced that if you say you're coming to pick up and pay for an item, that you actually show up and do so.
This is that awkward moment when you make a rant that makes everyone hate you.
Meh. Everyone already does, so I'm already used to that.
Now hear me out on "why CL prices should lower". Maybe there's a flaw in my logic, and if so, tell me. But this is how I see it.
Use food prices at the airport as a comparable example. Why does McDonalds, Pizza Hut, etc charge anywhere from 25 to 50% higher for the same items than they do on the street? Yes, I know that part of it is because of the higher rents. But why are the rents higher in the first place? Because the airport knows they can charge YOU a premium for....charging a premium for having a captive audience.
So couldn't that same logic be applied but in reverse?
On Ebay you can list an item that theoretically has worldwide exposure; a potential buyer pool that's measured in the Billions. If you decide on an auction style format, then...more is more. More people=more interest=more bids=more money for you. But again, this is with an assumption that you are selling vintage or discontinued items (i.e. second hand stuff). I'm not talking cases to hold your I-thingy in; sellers of that kind of crap can be found anywhere and everywhere.
Craigslist is just the opposite and deals mostly on a local level. More to the point...I can list an item there....and have a local potential buying pool of about a quarter million people as that's about how many are within a 25 mile radius. Or I can list it on Ebay and now the entire world can see it.
Do you see where I'm going with this?
Someone who might be interested in something I have for sale that lives in Rochester, NY isn't likely to take the trouble to comb through every single city in all 50 States looking for that item. He can do that or he can look on Ebay and be reasonably confident that he can buy and have it shipped to him. Just like X dozens, hundreds, or millions of other people. I haven't seen many CL listings written with that kind of exposure. Or, for that matter even offer shipping.
So wouldn't...or shouldn't...fewer buyers translate to lower demand...which in turn leads to a lower asking price?
Actually it is under the technical definition of a contract, its just that the judge would find you in contempt for wasting their time on a 30 dollar weedwacker sale. To have a contract you have to have an offer, acceptance, and consideration. Consideration being the agreed upon price for a good or service.
That is my point......a listing is not a legally binding agreement to sell something at said listing price.
Actually it is under the technical definition of a contract, its just that the judge would find you in contempt for wasting their time on a 30 dollar weedwacker sale. To have a contract you have to have an offer, acceptance, and consideration. Consideration being the agreed upon price for a good or service.
But it isn't the agreed upon price. So it isn't a contract. Upon calling Des finds out the price is NOW 60 bucks instead of ten... and he gets angry and withdraws he offer -- no contract.
Last edited by Tallysmom; 09-16-2014 at 05:08 PM..
Meh. Everyone already does, so I'm already used to that.
Now hear me out on "why CL prices should lower". Maybe there's a flaw in my logic, and if so, tell me. But this is how I see it.
Use food prices at the airport as a comparable example. Why does McDonalds, Pizza Hut, etc charge anywhere from 25 to 50% higher for the same items than they do on the street? Yes, I know that part of it is because of the higher rents. But why are the rents higher in the first place? Because the airport knows they can charge YOU a premium for....charging a premium for having a captive audience.
So couldn't that same logic be applied but in reverse?
On Ebay you can list an item that theoretically has worldwide exposure; a potential buyer pool that's measured in the Billions. If you decide on an auction style format, then...more is more. More people=more interest=more bids=more money for you. But again, this is with an assumption that you are selling vintage or discontinued items (i.e. second hand stuff). I'm not talking cases to hold your I-thingy in; sellers of that kind of crap can be found anywhere and everywhere.
Craigslist is just the opposite and deals mostly on a local level. More to the point...I can list an item there....and have a local potential buying pool of about a quarter million people as that's about how many are within a 25 mile radius. Or I can list it on Ebay and now the entire world can see it.
Do you see where I'm going with this?
Someone who might be interested in something I have for sale that lives in Rochester, NY isn't likely to take the trouble to comb through every single city in all 50 States looking for that item. He can do that or he can look on Ebay and be reasonably confident that he can buy and have it shipped to him. Just like X dozens, hundreds, or millions of other people. I haven't seen many CL listings written with that kind of exposure. Or, for that matter even offer shipping.
So wouldn't...or shouldn't...fewer buyers translate to lower demand...which in turn leads to a lower asking price?
Not necessarily. Let's say we have a large item to sell that we feel can sell for 200 bucks, but to deliver it will cost a lot of money that people aren't willing to pay and we certainly don't want to pack it up and send it out.
We put it on Craigslist and sell it for.... 200 bucks. It's what the market will bear. We found it, why shouldn't we get top dollar? Don't you want to get top dollar for your sales?
But I get it -- we sell online, too. And people aren't the rubes they used to be and more of them know what their stuff is worth. It sucks. We don't get to buy something for a dime and sell it for 100 dollars anymore. And yes -- SOME people are way overpricing and trying to get full retail out of things, which means to us they can keep it. It's not worth it to do this for pennies.
But as to share stories about the ones that got away... it's hard to know. The person that walked away with the Holy Grail DVD, might want to give it as a gift or keep it for themselves. Until he sells it, or we see it being sold -- we don't know what it's worth.
I'd rather talk about the time he bought a paperback book about Johnny Thunders, written totally in Japanese, with lots of pictures for 50¢... and sold it for $210. The lost Q-ray pendant he found on the street we sold for $250, after no one claimed it. The weird unworn tee from some really obscure band that only put out one bad album in the 60's... we paid 75¢ for it and it sold for $160.
While we're here, the flip side of Craigslist sales is also pretty common: Honest sellers often complain about posting a firm price and then getting contact after contact trying to low-ball them, often by ridiculous amounts.
Quote:
Originally Posted by PinaCarlotta
I feel like Oprah, "you get a rep! You get a rep! Reps for everybooooooooody " who's replied so far. Really, OP, where did you get the idea that CL was equivalent to a yard sale/ giveaway?
oh yes, those who reply, "I'll take xxx off your hands for $20" when you're asking $100.
I have sold a few things on Craigslist and try to price my items pretty fairly. It really irks me when some people ask question, after question, after question and they finally decide to buy the item and then say "I'll take it off your hands..." for 10% or 20% of the price that I stated in the ad.
I don't mind when buyers offer lower than my price (even when it is listed as firm) but it is pretty insulting to offer a really low-ball offer or to ask me to drive an hour to deliver the item or hold it for two weeks until they get paid. Sheesh!
So..1/20 of fair value on Craiglist and 1/4 of fair value on eBay...
And then you sell it where, to who, for fair value?
Under what circumstances should people be paying fair value? Just when you're the one who's going to get the money? Something tells me you won't have much success, but do try explaining to sellers that they should accept your insultingly low-ball offers because of the "severe deflationary economy" that you invented.
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