Maybe interestingly, my experience has been the exact reverse of this. Craigslist is the only place I get legitimate responses to my listings, and Facebook Marketplace is where I get people who try to pull of these scams, or people who want to pay half of the price I list. I wonder if it has to do with the types of items being sold?

I've sold things to real people on Craigslist, for cash. The scammers are easy to filter out, but I'm sure there are smarter ones out there whom I just haven't encountered yet.

They do warn you about scammers, and my feeling is that if they tried to filter out the vermin who say "my agent will arrive with a cashier's check to pick it up" the scammers would just find some way around it, and people would get a false sense of security to boot. Whack-a-mole games, in other words.

A site for discussion would be Discogs, where I've had almost nothing but great experiences: all nice, honest people. Maybe the fix for Craigslist would be to split into verticals, where a community could develop, something that's absent now.

> Maybe the fix for Craigslist would be to split into verticals

Feels like the time is ripe for something like that, too. I think you're right, that would really up Craigslist's game.

I’m less concerned about scammers ripping me off

What I don’t like is the emotional energy it takes to filter them out.

> At least on Facebook Marketplace, I can see who the person is, do they have a rating, do they know anyone I know etc etc.

I don't want that when I sell random stuff out of my house. I want to meet a random dude at a gas station, exchange cash, and never know anything about each other again.

And that's why these two services exist. They want spam control and you want anonymity. About the clearest example of separate markets.

Great way of seeing it. While I don't like being on Facebook, I now almost always tend towards it over Kijiji (Canadian alternative) and Craigslist for the reputation system.

Your experience is the opposite of mine. FB Marketplace is 100% scammers as best as I can tell. I've never had success. Also, never ever ever buy a product advertised on Facebook. Chinese scammers outright lie about the products and there are zero customer protections.

Craigslist on the other hand has generally been alright, although it is better to be a buyer than a seller. Most of the time I've had someone flake or ghost me they were a buyer.

> Chinese scammers outright lie about the products and there are zero customer protections.

The only way to use Facebook Marketplace to buy things is to purchase locally. Anything else is sheer insanity.

> At least on Facebook Marketplace, I can see who the person is, do they have a rating, do they know anyone I know etc etc.

Yet it doesn't stop scammer at all.

We've had trouble selling on Facebook marketplace. On craiglist, if people don't like your list price they just ignore you. On facebook people can start flamewars in your posts or harass you directly.

Other people have had trouble selling as well because of Facebook's moderation system.

A coworker's son participated in a high school archery team as a sophomore, then lost interest. My coworker listed the equipment on Marketplace, but after a day his listing was flagged for selling weapons.

He requested an appeal: the school has a zero tolerance policy for 'weapons' but allows students to carry their archery gear. By this reasoning, the listing should be fine, but Facebook's reviewer disagreed and banned him from marketplace for life.

Marketplace has posts? I thought the only thing you could do was message the seller directly.

I have an "Intelligent Human Turing Test" when I sell things on Craigslist (usually professional/pro-sumer music/audio equipment). If someone doesn't pass it I don't respond. If they do they are generally thrilled to be getting a real deal on gear that's in the shape it's been described. This has worked in the greater SF Bay area through good and bad economic times over the last 20+ years.

"In person, cash transactions ONLY, no shipping or trades. Scammers will be ignored. Prices are firm, please don't respond if you don't understand what that means - I monitor markets daily on (CL, eBay, Reverb, XYZ music sites), here are links to recent similar condition gear sold for $xxx more. Respond with a phone # and 2-3 times this week that work for you to talk or meet."

At my work some of our best employees (including myself!) were found through Craigslist. And as a hiring manager, CL ofter brings me better applicants than Zip Recruiter, Indeed, Idealist and other "mass application spam cannons" HR inexplicably favors that have made being a hiring manager a real PITA in the last 5 years.

> At my work some of our best employees (including myself!) were found through Craigslist

I had a co-worker in the pas who met his wife on Craigslist.

Most people assume this happened via the personals/missed connection sections but apparently it was b/c he saw a comment of hers on the forum section, messaged her to say he thought it was funny and the rest is history.

What is the scam? That the cheque won't clear?

France must be one of the last countries to still use cheques and they are often refused, but at least there is a reasonable threat for the account owners whose cheque would not clear.

It's a very common scam to send a cashier's check for an amount + some extra, where you are expected to cash the check, keep the change, and return the amount. Later, the check will reverse, having been caught as a fraudulent check, and you're left on the hook for the entire original amount of the check.

Just so everyone knows -- you should always be able to call the issuing bank to verify the legitimacy of a cashier's check. They can confirm whether the check exists for the given check number, date, and amount, and that it has not been cashed. (Also, Google the phone number for the bank, don't use a phone number listed on the check itself.)

This is what makes cashier's checks fairly scam-free if you know that.

(Also remember, this is about cashier's checks, not ordinary personal checks.)

Of course this does require that you make your buyer wait while you phone the bank (and possibly do this during bank business hours), get put on hold, etc. And deal with the social discomfort of so obviously not trusting them. And then the risk of what might happen afterwards once you discover they are trying to scam you -- do they just go away or do they get violent or something?

But if you tell them upfront that you'll be calling to verify the check when you meet, it's much more comfortable. Especially because if they're trying to pull the scam, they'll just give up and not meet in the first place.

(Oh, and obviously never accept extra payment and then separately refund a difference. That's scam avoidance 101. If they even suggest that, stop talking to them.)

Cashier's checks are not the same as cash.

If you're selling, you should always specify cash-only. Period, no exceptions. You can meet at a bank if you're nervous about having cash.

True, we have however in Europe a limitation on the amount you can pay by cash (3000€ ~ $3200).

Some transactions are prohibited by cash (notably when you buy a house, but that would not be through a classified ad :))

craigslist is a US company. "cashier's checks" are a US concept, AFAIK.