[seeker1950]

I've never listed anything on Craigslist before, until today.
I listed a quality piece of furniture today. I immediately
rec'd a couple of inquiries to which I responded
via email. I am asking $500 for this piece.
So I just got this second email from one of the
inquiries which says the person is out of town, but
if I send my: name,
physical address, postal code, phone #, asking price, email address,
they will send a certified check for $500. I think
this sounds fishy...not even seeing the piece of furniture?
Your thoughts, insights appreciated.

I've sold quite a bit on CL and yes, definitely a scam. Don't do it and block them from emailing you anymore.

[seeker1950]

Originally Posted by lioness0415

I've sold quite a bit on CL and yes, definitely a scam. Don't do it and block them from emailing you anymore.

Thx! I'm new to this!

Anytime they offer to send a check/PayPal and have you ship the item, it's a scam. Also, if they use very strange phrasing, that is not commonly American (like 100$ USD instead of $100, as we would write it), also usually a scam. Be careful, and good luck with your sale!!

[Maven]

You're smart, realizing that didn't sound right! It's just awful how many people all over the world have no conscience--I don't know if they're all sociopaths, but a lot are--about hurting other people physically or financially.

Yes, that sounds like a scam. I've bought and sold things on CL but never had any scam attempts. Got some very strange emails though.
I've also paid and accepted payment via paypal for CL transactions. Haven't had a problem. I never take checks and I always pay in cash in face to face transactions. That seems to be a given for CL. So are photos.
I'm curious why this person didn't know the asking price and how they planned to take possession of the furniture.

[seeker1950]

Thanks, all of you for your responses. I did not list my phone number. I just listed the item and the people are responding thru Craigslist. I've rec'd a couple more of these strange requests, stating they'll be sending a certified check after they receive my info: name, address, phone #, price. As Lioness said, they do seem to use strange phrasing, poor punctuation. I'm thinking it might be best to just remove the listing.
Yesterday, I also received a notice that I had requested to change my Ebay password, which I didn't.

[Maven]

I keep getting notices telling me I was supposed to receive a package (I hadn't ordered anything) and that it didn't arrive. It usually says it's from DHL (with their logo--it's a delivery service like FedEx and UPS), but it doesn't look very professional, even so. They want me to click a link (that doesn't go to DHL's actual company) and give them information so I can get the package (the one I didn't order). Yeah, right!

[healingme4me]

Any CL transaction, I have ever done, is face to face.

Certainly sounds, like scam material, that you mentioned, in your OP.

The request to change, your ebay password, sounds like a 'phishing' scam.

Hope it all works out for the best for you.

Originally Posted by seeker1950

I've never listed anything on Craigslist before, until today.
I listed a quality piece of furniture today. I immediately
rec'd a couple of inquiries to which I responded
via email. I am asking $500 for this piece.
So I just got this second email from one of the
inquiries which says the person is out of town, but
if I send my: name,
physical address, postal code, phone #, asking price, email address,
they will send a certified check for $500. I think
this sounds fishy...not even seeing the piece of furniture?
Your thoughts, insights appreciated.

Seeker1950,
I just wanted to let you know that you were VERY wise not to send them any of this information!
Without giving up too much of my own info, I work for a fortune 500 company and this is known as Phishing.
Google it and read up on it. People do this crap 24/7.
This is the beginning of Identity Theft, unauthorized account access, and a general invasion of your privacy.
Once they have some basic info such as this they go on a hunt for all the info they can find on you and if you are one of the unlucky ones, they find a way in and then you wake up one day and any matter of hell has broken loose in your life.

Now please DON't get worried because you didnt send them any info.
Just remember what the old folks taught us BEFORE the internet.......
If it SOUNDS too good to be true, it probably IS too good to be true.

And as others have already posted, good luck with the sale.

[avoice]

Western union it to right

[Maranara]

Craigslist warns up front to not deal with out of town buyers, and for good reason.

Originally Posted by Maranara

Craigslist warns up front to not deal with out of town buyers, and for good reason.

That's good advice but people can takes steps to make legit out of town or out of state transactions. I'm in TX and I bought an expensive sports car I found on the Seattle/Tacoma CL. Paid with a bank transfer and had the car shipped to me. It took several phone calls, cooperation, and some trust... especially on my part. I had a buddy in the area who checked the car for me and I'd seen pics but I still had some doubts. When the car arrived it was much better than I'd hoped. I've also bought and sold rare and custom made car parts via CL with out of state partners. There are CL search engines for finding items on CL nationwide.
Every out of state inquiry isn't a scam. You have to use some personal judgment too. I wish I'd kept some of my CL scam emails. They didn't even make sense.

[heyhey.im.j]

I buy and sell on craigslist a lot. Here's a few ideas for you that I did.
1. create a simple email address with bogus information on the profile part (if it asks for name, birth date, address etc.) This keeps all the spam out of your actual email account and spammers can't tap into your personal info or stored personal emails. Read the craigslist spam alerts, it'll tell you what to look for. If a reply email says something generic like "I'm interested in the ITEM you have for sale", and not specifically what you have listed for sale, then it's more than likely a scam. Always meet in a public place if you can, if not, have someone else there with you. And only take CASH. Paypal can't help you without a tracking number. Oh and this might seem crude, but if the email has terrible or broken English, let that be a small flag. Not everyone is grammatically correct, all the time, but I'd weed those out personally.