Craigslist Scam

Trying to sell my wife’s car on Craigslist as we have replaced it with a newer one - ad honestly stated mileage , condition , services done etc. I posted the price as x dollars OBO.
Only a few inquiries - three of which asked about the cars condition and mileage - guess they couldn’t read .
One asked if I was the original owner and if the price was firm - reasonable question. I told him we were the second owners and had the car for ten years.
I also told him I would listen to reasonable offers when he came to see the car.
A few days passed when I got an email from him saying he was too busy at work but wanted the car and would pay the asking price plus 50 bucks to hold the car for him . He would overnight the check to me via UPS and send me a tracking number. After check cleared he would make arrangements to collect the car. He needed my address to send the check to. I responded with the address but instructed him to phone me before sending check .
I received a few more communications from him every other day or so - each one followed by my response asking him to phone me. Never got a call.
The last said the check was on the way and would include an extra $4k to give the freight people when they came to pickup the car as he wanted them to pick up other “items” in the area. Wanted me to deposit the money in my account and pay the shipper myself- yeah, right.
The letter came today and I refused delivery - return address said “ Farm & Ranch Supply “ in Montana. Who the hell buys a 14 year old $ 4K car with 150k miles on the coast of NJ and pays another 4 k to ship it ? A scammer , that’s who. I’m sure the next communication was going to ask me to refund the $4k shipping as something changed with the shipping, all in hopes that I would be stupid enough to do it before seeing if the check cleared - which I am sure it never would because it would be found to bounce higher than a Super Ball .

Richard Tool said:

Trying to sell my wife’s car on Craigslist as we have replaced it with a newer one - ad honestly stated mileage , condition , services done etc. I posted the price as x dollars OBO.
Only a few inquiries - three of which asked about the cars condition and mileage - guess they couldn’t read .
One asked if I was the original owner and if the price was firm - reasonable question. I told him we were the second owners and had the car for ten years.
I also told him I would listen to reasonable offers when he came to see the car.
A few days passed when I got an email from him saying he was too busy at work but wanted the car and would pay the asking price plus 50 bucks to hold the car for him . He would overnight the check to me via UPS and send me a tracking number. After check cleared he would make arrangements to collect the car. He needed my address to send the check to. I responded with the address but instructed him to phone me before sending check .
I received a few more communications from him every other day or so - each one followed by my response asking him to phone me. Never got a call.
The last said the check was on the way and would include an extra $4k to give the freight people when they came to pickup the car as he wanted them to pick up other “items” in the area. Wanted me to deposit the money in my account and pay the shipper myself- yeah, right.
The letter came today and I refused delivery - return address said “ Farm & Ranch Supply “ in Montana. Who the hell buys a 14 year old $ 4K car with 150k miles on the coast of NJ and pays another 4 k to ship it ? A scammer , that’s who. I’m sure the next communication was going to ask me to refund the $4k shipping as something changed with the shipping, all in hopes that I would be stupid enough to do it before seeing if the check cleared - which I am sure it never would because it would be found to bounce higher than a Super Ball .

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You were wise to be careful, there are so many different scams going on the internet sites now, that it seems some people fall for them.

The ONLY time I've ever used Craigslist, I got that "I'll over-pay you so you can pay the shipper" scam.

No thanx!

This scam has been doing the rounds for many years now it happens from Ebay to any other ads place everywhere, they have also sent payment by PayPal using a fake PayPal email to you saying they put the money in your account and use their attachment on the fake PayPal email, never open it there only go into your PayPal account direct.
This happened to me when selling my old BMW many years ago after the ebay closed with no offers then someone contacted me not longer after it closed and said he will buy it but the ususal I am off shore working at the moment and I will pay by PayPal and add another $1k if you pay the shipper, the PayPal came by email saying money has been put into my account and of course going to my PayPal account direct no money was put into my account and replying to his emails told him so but he kept sending the fake PayPal email to me so I just played along with him, then he was phoning me up telling me he put the money into my account which he didn't asking for me to ship it to his transport people, then he started to get aggressive with his emails and phone calls till I told him it was in the hands of the police, that was the last I heard from him.
It just pays to be one step ahead of these scammers and never open any attachments from any emails they send you, its a full time job with these scammers to get money from unexpecting people, you just got to be smart than them or you will lose your money or what ever you are selling.

Ashley

A legit buyer would try to buy lower. These scammers all have one thing in common. They offer more than the asking price. Only the greedy will get sucked in.

Just posted my car to several sites, CL, Kijiji and AutoTrader. Had a message within hours apparently from AutoTrader stating an interested party had responded. The response was "is it still available and whats my best price?" Instructions were to reply via my email app.

Im highly suspicious and even wondering if the actual email is a deep fake, meaning could it be direct from the perpetrator and not from the AT system? This would let them fake the embedded links back to a fake AT page etc. Not far fetched at all as many fake PayPal examples have been reported like that.
Will go to AT site myself, not via the emailed links to correspond with this "person". Think ill say price is now 10k over listing price to see if they still bite

You can check the email address - right click on the sender and the real email appears or click reply and watch the address bar - if it changes several times then discard draft.

I found a 5 year old Jeep for sale on CL for $1000. It was worth probably 15-20k at the time so I knew right away it was a scam. The ad came with a sob story about how it belonged to the lady's husband who passed away and it brought back too many bad memories, blah, blah, blah... I played along out of curiosity. "She" said she would deliver the Jeep to an address of my choosing and I could keep it for two weeks before I paid her to make sure that I liked it. Needless to say the Jeep never showed up. What kind of scam is this? There's no way the scammer gains anything! They would have to provide the actual vehicle (which they probably didn't have) before they got any money! Who's dumber in this case - the scammer or the victim?!?!?

Here is a really bad one. A contractor working for a friend of mine has a 14 year old son who wanted a dirt bike . He found one on Craigslist that was way underpriced - too good to be true - in a neighboring state. Cash only deal - $ 1000. Made the call and was given an address . Drove down with the son and cash to the address which turned out to be a disused industrial park . The red flags were up but as they got out of the truck three men came around the corner and asked if they were here for the dirt bike - said it’s in this building and walked back around the corner . At this point the buyer was ready to get back in the truck and bail and called to his son to get in the truck but the kid in his excitement didn’t hear or listen and followed the men around the corner where he was taken down and held with a gun to his head and threatened to kill him if the father didn’t produce the cash.
The father had no choice but to hand over the money . The scammers ran off fortunately leaving the buyers shaken but otherwise unharmed.

“A contractor working for a friend of mine has a 14 year old son who wanted a dirt bike . He found one on Craigslist that was way underpriced - too good to be true.”

That should have been the end of the story. Only the foolhardy and greedy would go further. It has SCAM written in big bold letters, yet the victim willingly meets with the scammer.

Why, I could have been a very rich man had I only accepted ONE of the offers from Nigerian royalty. Or the big profit I could have made from vehicle sales to offshore oil rig workers that responded to my Craig’s List ads.
.
There is an acronym for those who get duped by a scammer. SUCKER.

KNorton said:

I found a 5 year old Jeep for sale on CL for $1000. It was worth probably 15-20k at the time so I knew right away it was a scam. The ad came with a sob story about how it belonged to the lady's husband who passed away and it brought back too many bad memories, blah, blah, blah... I played along out of curiosity. "She" said she would deliver the Jeep to an address of my choosing and I could keep it for two weeks before I paid her to make sure that I liked it. Needless to say the Jeep never showed up. What kind of scam is this? There's no way the scammer gains anything!

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See my post # 9

Several years ago I had response on a Service Honda CR500AF from a guy in the Navy. Listed price $5,500.00
I'm in California, he's in Florida. All kinds of red flags are going off in my head.
After a few back and forth's, he says he needs copies of the title, Reg # etc. to submit to the Navy Credit Union.
I responded for him to refer me to loan officer directly...
Last I heard from him...

MichaelB said:

Several years ago I had response on a Service Honda CR500AF from a guy in the Navy. Listed price $5,500.00
I'm in California, he's in Florida. All kinds of red flags are going off in my head.
After a few back and forth's, he says he needs copies of the title, Reg # etc. to submit to the Navy Credit Union.
I responded for him to refer me to loan officer directly...
Last I heard from him...

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Were the red flags because the guy resided in Florida? Living in Orange County, CA you should have a lot of first hand experience with scammers. When I lived there, Orange County had scammers 6 foot on center.

Richard Tool said:

Here is a really bad one. A contractor working for a friend of mine has a 14 year old son who wanted a dirt bike . He found one on Craigslist that was way underpriced - too good to be true - in a neighboring state. Cash only deal - $ 1000. Made the call and was given an address . Drove down with the son and cash to the address which turned out to be a disused industrial park . The red flags were up but as they got out of the truck three men came around the corner and asked if they were here for the dirt bike - said it’s in this building and walked back around the corner . At this point the buyer was ready to get back in the truck and bail and called to his son to get in the truck but the kid in his excitement didn’t hear or listen and followed the men around the corner where he was taken down and held with a gun to his head and threatened to kill him if the father didn’t produce the cash.
The father had no choice but to hand over the money . The scammers ran off fortunately leaving the buyers shaken but otherwise unharmed.

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Similar thing happened in the UK when a couple went to look at a top of the range BMW car, the seller asked to meet in an empty car park, which should have set off alarm bells right away. When they turned up the seller asked if they were after the BMW, when they said yes, they produced a gun, took £10k off them their car and mobile phone, leaving them with nothing.

Just came across another one. Seeing a 1967 Austin Mini complete rotisserie restoration with Supercharged 1380cc engine on CL locally, sent a reply to seller for additional details. After three such requests over a few weeks with no replies, I finally get a text msg asking to send my email addy for seller's wife to contact me (as he was in hospital). OK, I think, a bit out of the norm but could be legit. Today I get back an email from his Wife with a dozen detailed images of the car and all looks great. She states husband is in need of hearst surgery and that's why they are selling. I request a few more details on the car and immediately get this back:

"Hello again,

I will try to explain the whole situation, the doctor gave me 2 news: the bad news is that my husband needs a transplant, and the good news is that a donor compatible with my husband has been found in Phoenix, Arizona ( Mayo Cardiac Clinic ), he was waiting for 5 years on a list. Because I have to be personally with my husband and take care of the documents that need to be made at the hospital, we hired a delivery company to take care of the transaction on our behalf, the car is in their custody in Fort McMurray and I chose a national package, which means that wherever I find a buyer in the country they can handle the delivery. Delivery time is between 3-9 days depending on your address, and the delivery costs will be my responsibility. From the moment of delivery you will have 15 days to drive it and test it with your mechanic, if you confirm them that you will keep it, they will release the money to me, if you want a refund they will send the money to your bank account and they will come take the car . If you are interested, I will need the following details from you: full name, address and cell phone, then the delivery company will send you an Invoice with all the info you will need to complete the transaction."

No actual mention of the car details I had asked about. I do a google for her name and email addy (some strange "@aolcabbles.com" domain. and find this on a scammer report:

"
www.fd-transport.com - FD-TRANSPORT SCAM FAKE COMPANY FRAUD
#404824 by ary peart Mon Feb 17, 2020 5:54 pm

WATCH OUT WWW.fd-transport.com , FD-TRANSPORT IS A FAKE TRANSPORT COMPANY, FAKE WEBSITE , TRIED TO SCAM ME FOR 19K , don t fall for it.

TRIED TO BUY A CAR ON THE INTERNET THE SELLER SENT ME THIS:
Hello,

As I told you in my first email, the reason why I sell this car is because my husband will do a heart transplant, the transplant will take place in Mayo Cardiac Clinic in Phoenix, AZ here we found a compatible donor. My husband is already hospitalized and in few hours i will fly to Phoenix. I have signed a contract with a delivery company to take care of the selling on my behalf. The car is already at the warehouse in La Loche - Saskatchewan sealed and ready for the delivery. I paid them a full nationally delivery package, this is the reason why used more regions. The deal includes free delivery and it will arrive at your address in 4-6 days, depending on the exact location. From the moment when arrives at your door, you will have 15 days to test and inspect it. If it doesn't match my description or if you find anything wrong with it, delivery company will refund your money in 24 hours and I will be in charge of the return shipping fee. They will hold the money until you confirm that the car is like you expected. If you're ready for this purchase, I need to know your your full name, address and cell phone, as soon as I have this details I will start the official procedure. The delivery company will send you an Invoice with all the info you will need to complete the transaction.

THEN THE TRANSPORT COMPANY CONTACTED ME :
Dear buyer ,

You are receiving this email because the seller (Nancy Colson) has registered you as a
potential buyer for the vehicle 2016 Toyota 4Runner 4WD.

This invoice is in PDF electronic format. Double click on the attached file to view the invoice and
please follow the enclosed payment instructions.

Your invoice is attached to this email. Follow the enclosed payment instructions.
After carefully review the information, please contact our Customer Support Department at:
(639) 638-8635 in order to confirm and approve your payment.

http://www.FD-Transport.com
Thanks for using FD-Transport & Logistics !

THEY ASK 19000$ UPFRONT PAYMENT , SCAM ALERT , BE AWARE , YOU WILL LOSE YOUR MONEY.
"

Basically word for word what was sent to me.

Think I'll pass on this nice mini....

Great what you did O wise one. Which leads me to ask you a question, do you have on your e mail account a phishing box where you can put this scammers email?

I put t he email thread into the delete box and will clear it shortly. I did not "download" any of the attachments to my local drive but did review them through the gmail browser screen. Pretty sure that is OK to not off load any embedded malicious coding. I do have an up to date security package on my PC (BitDefender).

A word to the wise... If it seems fishy, it probably is. Go with your gut instinct!

as soon as the other party ‘takes control’, and it can be very subtle, you are no longer making your own decisions. So I now interrupt the flow,rudely if necessary, very early on, including nuisance calls.
If they won’t send a NEW photo with them next to the object, and preferably something recognisable in background to show where they are, then I’m out, and that’s only the start of my checks, regardless of how they want you to play it.