Craigslist Rant

I hate when people put in all caps "NO LOW BALLERS".

Well, if I don't think the car is worth what your selling, I'm going to haggle and sorry if I offend you if you're asking $4000 and I start haggling at $2800. Doesn't mean I won't go up, I just want to get a clear idea of how much you will let this car go for.

I had a guy hang up on me. It said "No Low Ballers" and he was selling a Corvair with no drivetrain for $1500 (body needed repaint, supposedly no rust). I asked if I could give him my best offer and he said sure. I told him I'd give him $900 and he immediately hung up on me.

Thinking I lost connection with him I called back and he answered. I proceeded to apologize for the lost connection and he admitted he hung up. I asked why and he said "I'm not taking a $600 hit on that car". I proceeded to tell him that the model he was selling wasn't worth what he was asking, he had no drivetrain in it or to give to me with the cost, and I was going to have to drive (with a truck and trailer) 2.5 hours to see the car to even see if it's worth what he's asking.

He then told me if he had the engine and trans, he would be selling it for $2000.

So, I just told him good luck selling it and it was on CL for 2 months after that. Its finally off, so he either got tired of trying or some sorry sap bought it.

Why do you hate it? They're saving you the trouble of calling and lowballing him and him telling you to get lost. Or he's trying to, apparently it doesn't always work.

If he says no lowballing he obviously thinks he's asking a fair price and doesn't want a lot of people calling him and wasting his time making what he thinks are ridiculous offers. If the seller is asking a ridiculous price, it will still be around after a while, which this one was. After it's been around a while, then you can call and try lowballing him.

Just for giggles, put up a Craigslist ad for a Corvair with what you think is a reasonable price, or even a screaming good deal. I'll bet 50% of the calls are from people lowballing you.

Bob

I like people who say "no lowballs" and don't even have a asking price... How is that even supposed to work.

Oh, that hits one of mine.

"Can you knock off $X because I'm coming from Timbuk-three?".

Uh, no. It's not my fault you're not local, why should I give you a discount because you can't find what I'm selling closer to you?

I like to find ads posted by my friends and respond with poorly worded lowball offers.

$900 on a $1500 asking price is not a lowball offer, it's a fair place to start.

Some people don't know how it works.

I can kinda understand where he might be coming from, honestly, I'm pretty close to done with craigslist. You do get what you pay for, a free ad, means lots of calls wanting to give you almost no money or lots of people saying they will meet you at a certain time and never showing up without even a call. I can't even get 50% off retail of brand new universal parts like a painless wiring solinoid kit in the box never installed, lol. It's almost comical. I don't remember it ever being that bad so I'm thinking it might just be a sign of the times. Oh well, time to go back to ebay for awhile until I get tired of paying to ship everything and all the darn sellers fees.

I was, in my mind, willing to go up to $1200 if the car had no rust, but the guy was being such a jackass, that I didn't offer him more than I had already asked. He didn't have to have to hang up on me, that was just rude, he could have said no, he wanted more than that.

I threw in the bit about how far I had to drive more for how serious I was about buying it, not for him to knock off money for me (now I read my first post, I didn't word that right). I threw that in at the end anyway. All I did was waste 5 minutes of this guys life.

Once he said I could give him my best offer, he shouldn't have responded the way he did. I have no problem haggling, but the way this guy reacted, I feel like the best offer he wanted hear was $1499.

Schmidlap wrote: If he says no lowballing he obviously thinks he's asking a fair price and doesn't want a lot of people calling him and wasting his time making what he thinks are ridiculous offers.

But what he thinks is a fair price and a potential buyer thinks is a fair price are almost always two different amounts. How are these potential buyers supposed to know what he considers a low ball offer unless they call and ask?

Ihad my SR on for $1500. I guy called and asked if I would take $1200. I said make it $1300 and come and get it. Never heard from him again.

qdseeker wrote:

Schmidlap wrote: If he says no lowballing he obviously thinks he's asking a fair price and doesn't want a lot of people calling him and wasting his time making what he thinks are ridiculous offers.

But what he thinks is a fair price and a potential buyer thinks is a fair price are almost always two different amounts. How are these potential buyers supposed to know what he considers a low ball offer unless they call and ask?

If he's asking $1500, and wants now low ballers, then he wants $1500. Seems simple to me. If he doesn't get $1500, thats his concern.

If $1500 is the lowest you will take, put "$1500 FIRM" in the ad. Don't make people guess what a "lowball" is and then act insulted and be rude if their offer isn't what you'll take. If you don't want people to play games with you, don't play games with them.

My rant (not to hijack) is people who place ads and don't respond. I have answered two ads in the last couple of days and gotten squat. If you're going to place an ad, answer your berkeleying emails.

iceracer wrote: Ihad my SR on for $1500. I guy called and asked if I would take $1200. I said make it $1300 and come and get it. Never heard from him again.

I get that alot too, seems like people don't want to haggle, just want a really really low price. Not that the op was trying to do that, it's just what sellers are running into. I hung up on a guy the other day, flaked on meeting me to look at some parts, I called him and he said "oh sorry, can we do it tomorrow" my reply: "No" click. lol. He probably didn't really care, most of the time, if someone actually needs a part, they will be there, respect a fair price, and your schedule.

I don't take email offers. If you want to talk about price, come look at my car first, or at least call me and I'll give you an idea if I'll negotiate.

I generally ask 20% more than my bottom dollar because I usually deal in cars that are under $5k.

If someone makes me an offer sight unseen, I usually politely tell them to come take a test drive and then we'll talk.

Are you more interested in buying a car or practicing your negotiating skills and wasting someone else's time?

Chalk me up for someone who won't haggle before they come look too. If it's not worth your time to come look at it, it's not worth my time to haggle. Why should the price change just because you asked?

An I also don't care one bit how far someone has to come to get it. If you aren't willing to drive than look in (only) your local clist.

oldopelguy wrote: Chalk me up for someone who won't haggle before they come look too. If it's not worth your time to come look at it, it's not worth my time to haggle. Why should the price change just because you asked? An I also don't care one bit how far someone has to come to get it. If you aren't willing to drive than look in (only) your local clist.

+1, Im more than willing to negotiate, once you've come to look at the car and know what you are negotiating. But blind offers are just lowball fishing and nothing more.

I've posted too many times about how I played that game with some craigslisters for fun so I wont list type it up again, but if you are a serious buyer I'll work with you. If you havent come to see the car, you arent a serious buyer. Exceptions made for distance buyers but I expect they will ask for extra photos and information. If the first contact includes a number less than 10% below my asking price then you are probably just wasting my time unless you've seen the car or asked for extensive details/photos.

A little while back I found a 2nd gen RX7 on CL that according to the ad needed a fuel pump and then all would be wunnerful. So I called the guy, asked if I could bring a pump and try to get it started, he said yeah but when you get it running the price will go up. I said how much and he doubled the asking price. Hmm, so I fix your POS and you are then going to rape me? Nope.

Jensenman wrote: A little while back I found a 2nd gen RX7 on CL that according to the ad needed a fuel pump and then all would be wunnerful. So I called the guy, asked if I could bring a pump and try to get it started, he said yeah but when you get it running the price will go up. I said how much and he doubled the asking price. Hmm, so I fix your POS and you are then going to rape me? Nope.

well that's just a jackass seller. Id be taking my pump and leaving him with a broke car. He's too lazy to fix it himself.

Here's the thing. I ASKED the guy if I could give him my best offer (which wasn't). He said go ahead. Right there I felt that I could try to give him a lower price than what he was asking. If he said "No, I would like you to look at the car before we negotiate" I would have been a little more serious and thrown the wife in the car one Sunday and gone and taken a look, then worked it out from there. If he said "No, I need to go higher than that." Then I would have and still had gone up to see it. The guy had six descent photos that I felt didn't need to require me to ask him for more. I was interested in the car, it's exactly what I was looking for.

The man hung up on me without a reply.

Maybe yes, I didn't go about it the right way, but he could have definitely gone about it a different way. Also, there are terminologies people need to learn what they mean before they post an Ad.

Also, for the whole distance thing, I don't know what you guys consider local, but I live on the very south end of the Chicago Suburbs. Just to get to a town on the North or Northwest Chicago Suburbs can take 2 hours, especially with the road construction that plagues our highways in the summer. That's the stuff that comes up on the Chicago CL.

On a slightly related note, I had my MGs listed on RacingJunk and I got an offer of lawnmowers for them. Really?

I had a GRM'er come to get a Peugeot 505 that I had diagnosed as having a bad fuel pump for $500. He asked if he could replace it first and I said 'sure.'

He wouldn't let me help much, got it done in about 15 minutes and took it for a test drive. I was happy to see it go and I'm sure he was relieved that it was a solid diagnosis. Win-win.

But I think GRM transactions are totally different than CL.

GRM transactions are definitely different.

To the OP just going by "if it was me" here and how I price things.

Easy negotiation on anything I price (or anything Im buying for that matter) is 10% if you are within 10% of asking we can talk. If you are within 20% I'll at least consider you serious. You were neither, you hadn't looked at the car, you were taking a blind shot at it. Hey, works for some folks with some sellers. If you did it to me I probably wouldnt have hung up on you but we wouldnt be having a long follow on conversation either.

There was a guy advertising a GT750 about 40 miles from here. I call same day and get a message that his cell phone "hasn't been hooked up". Tried for months. Same answer. It's now been two years. Same answer. This shiny happy person has been advertising stuff (Googled the phone #) all over the web for months with the same number.

What do you say about somebody like that? "Stupid" would seem like a compliment...

JThw8 wrote: GRM transactions are definitely different. To the OP just going by "if it was me" here and how I price things. Easy negotiation on anything I price (or anything Im buying for that matter) is 10% if you are within 10% of asking we can talk. If you are within 20% I'll at least consider you serious. You were neither, you hadn't looked at the car, you were taking a blind shot at it. Hey, works for some folks with some sellers. If you did it to me I probably wouldnt have hung up on you but we wouldnt be having a long follow on conversation either.

I agree with the 10-20% easy transaction rule, and resulting attitude. I usually won't go after anything unless I know the seller knows what they have and knows what they're doing with it and if I'm really interested, I like to start 20% off and move up from there, now if I'm fishing I'll toss 50% off numbers and when they say no I don't care, nor try to educated them on how bad their prices are.

On a related note I had a thread earlier this year when I was going after a Fiat and I went to look at an X1/9, guy sold it to the other guy after needing time to 'consider' my offer even after I told him I'd beat the other guy but to give me a chance, I got pissed and ranted about it, in retrospect, I was crying over spilled milk. The buyer summarily re-listed it a week later for $1000 more than the original price with no work to the car, he even started disassembling the engine which won't run (I knew why when I inspected it). Nearly 6 months later he hasn't sold it, he's dropped the price to $500 more than I know he paid, and I emailed him what his bottom price was, $50 off that price. I laughed, bought a 124 Spider and haven't looked back. Oh and he's still trying to sell the thing

I guess the moral of the story, don't put your emotions into car buying, keep it cold and calculating, much easier to live with your decisions, and the other party...