our opinions: CURMUDGEON MUSINGS
The Last
BY MARK BROWN
Word
Wanting to sell stuff ...
e recently began selling some of our “stuff,” that
we have way too much of. This endeavor falls
under the heading, “Everything in This World is Way Too
Difficult.” I’ll tell you about it, in hopes that it might help
you to avoid some of the traps that we have stumbled
across.
First of all, I have come to the conclusion that you
spend the first half of your life accumulating stuff, and the
last half of your life getting rid of it. My wife and I happen
to be in the “getting rid of it,” stage of our lives.
So how do you go about doing that?
Well, we thought that since other people we know had
experienced some success over the years selling their stuff
on Craigslist, we would give it a try. After all, how difficult
could selling stuff be? Here’s what we found.
First, my wife put an ad on Craigslist for a sauna. I put
an ad up for a telescope. She put up her sauna four or five
hours before I did. So, she gets an e-mail right away that
says, “I want your sauna if it is still for sale.” She replied,
“It is.” She received a note right back that said, “I will pay
your asking price, and pay you $50.00 extra because I will
overnight a certified check, and when you cash it, I will
come and get the sauna, and for your trouble of holding it
for me, you can keep the extra $50.00.”
At first that sounded OK. My wife was excited about
selling said sauna so fast.
But, before she had a chance to respond back, I
received the exact same e-mail from a different person
about my telescope — it was verbatim!
OK, now maybe we should have known right away,
but not having dealt with this before, for a minute greed
took over and we thought, “WOW!”
But, I don’t believe in coincidences, so we quickly
responded back to both emails that it was cash only, no
checks certified or otherwise. Just to explain, for the naive
like us, what they must be doing is banking on our igno-
rance. If we had accepted the deal, and cashed the check,
gotten the cash, given the thief our merchandise, then a
W
112
few days later the certified or cashier’s check bounces
(because it would certainly be a fake) at the source, the
bank then charges us back for it, and the thief has our
stuff. What a scam! Who would come up with a scam
like that? A sauna and telescope for free, and we are out
$1800.
The point is, there must be a scam lurking in almost
everything you try to do today. You can’t do better than
remembering the saying — “If it sounds too good to be
true,” ... stay the heck away from it!
Some tips just from my personal beliefs:
Do not put any pertinent personal info up on
Facebook, especially date of birth, even the high school
you attended, nicknames, your kid’s info. In other words,
anything that would allow someone to figure out user-
names and pass codes.
Do not give out any info over the phone; people are
working 24/7 to figure out ways to scam you, to get your
sensitive info, and they come up with some legitimate-
sounding scenarios to get you to part with it.
Do not leave any sensitive papers of any kind lying
around. Have what we refer to for businesses as a clean
desk policy. When you’re not using it, put it away; same
with laptops and iPads. You have to connect the dots
today. The world has changed.
When I was younger, we used to throw our canceled
checks in the trash. You just can’t have that kind of atti-
tude anymore. The evil thieves are crawling around in
your woodwork.
If only they would expend half that much effort and
creativity in working to earn an honest living, there would
be no limit to what they could accomplish. But, n