so I put up a MacBook on craigslist yesterday, and within a few hours I received a response from an interested buyer in London.

being that it was london, which is nowhere near muncie, IN, i immediately thought it was a scam.

but she wrote: "If you will let me know the total cost of shipping via usps priority handling with insurance.....I can send the payment overnight via paypal and upon confirmation of payment you can then proceed to ship item in the morning...Get back soon"

so I don't really know how i could be scammed if i get the payment first and it's confirmed.

am i missing something, or did i luck out with an early sale?




Awaiting your prompt reply,
Gen. Toots Onajobi, exiled prince of Nigeria

never trust a Nigerian.

That sounds like a scam to me. A prince, even an exiled one, would probably buy new to get the full warranty.

Run away.

When in doubt on CL, assume scam

The replies in this thread worry me more than her e-mail.

There's a page on craigslist where they detail scams.

http://www.craigslist.org/about/scams

The language sounds iffy though. I hate it when people get all urgent.

so, assuming the gen toots onajobi thing is your own joke, i'd still balk at this sale. you're telling me no one is selling a laptop in london?

Buying one in the US is probably way cheaper than the UK. I don't know about used laptops, but it's certainly true for new ones.

Email Paypal. They'll probably tell you with more certainty if you're at an risk.

This is correct. Straight scam. I don't exactly know how it works but I received essentially the exact same email when I was selling something a few months ago.

I responded once and the next email was for a little more information than I was prepared to give. I didn't respond after that and they never followed up.

ABORT.

No shit.

There was a drugged out lady here in Lincoln who just tried selling her kid on CL. I'm sure it is a somewhat legitimate site for more urban cities, but it is so sketchy and mostly a joke here.

you're the only one that correctly construed the general toots thing, which was obviously confusing. sorry, board

the only things that pop into my paranoid mind is maybe she is some computer forensics whiz and hopes to drill down into the disk and get a bunch of security info i "thought" i deleted

or maybe macs are really expensive in the UK

either way, i guess if i send her the shipping cost info and a grand pops up in my paypal account, not much could go wrong

eh?

here's a followup email exchange:

Okay i will be waiting to hear from you again soon...I am a Nurse and a mum to be precise ...my daughter is the student and she really needs this macbook....

write back soon as you can about the shipping fee and also send me your paypal email account id so i can send payment straight away...

On Mon, Jun 15, 2009 at 1:53 PM, Jonathon wrote:

I will get that information and get back to you. Are you a student?


J

It really wasn't confusing at all.

I got the joke jonboy.

You know paypal will charge the seller (that's you) like 3%? Unless you do an e-check, which takes time.

See if she balks at the e-check. Claim that you don't want to get hit with the 3%.

It's not gonna pop up. You'll get a fake email that looks like you got the money, perhaps even a bogus link to paypal. Most schmoes will see the email and then just send off the item. To London.

and if she goes for the e-check, just let her know you have to wait for it to clear in your bank before you ship that computer.

I dunno, if she gets the money to you, it would be fine i guess but it's going to be a fortune to ship it to London and personally I would be far to lazy to deal with all this.

yeah, making sure it clears in my bank will be the key

Maybe you can trade it straight up for her magic lamp that still has two wishes left.

you must be really desperate to part with this macbook.

I did as well, and I still say run away.

It's a scam...

And I'm pretty sure she can reverse the charges from paypal. You ship the computer...She can make all kind of false claims (arrived damaged, not what she thought it was, etc....) and paypal will take the money out and give it back to her, and she'll have your computer...

general rule of thumb for craigslist......cash and in person only....