Because Craigslist is ONLY for face to face CASH transactions or it's always a scam. There are no exceptions. Craigslists scam warnings page specifically tells users to never give out PayPal details because of scams https://www.craigslist.org/about/scams
"Never give out financial info (bank account, social security, paypal account, etc)."
It also has these warning signs from the scam list:
"Deal locally, face-to-face ―follow this one rule and avoid 99% of scam attempts." -- the buyer won't meet you
"Beware offers involving shipping - deal with locals you can meet in person." -.- again he won't meet you
They either send a fake PayPal email or pay from a hacked account hoping you ship before the account holder discovers they were hacked. Once they have your PayPal details they will target you with phishing scams to hack YOUR account
Another common scam is that they have you ship to an unverfied address. Then once they have it, they contact Paypal claiming their account was hacked and there is an unknown transaction. Paypal contacts you asking for signed proof of delivery to the buyer's verified address. You won't have this as the address they told you to ship to wasn't the one on their account, and Paypal refunds the buyer out of your account
This article from 2008 explains one of the most common Craigslist PayPal scams but people keep falling for it http://consumerist.com/2008/10/30/how-a-...
While it says Nigeria and laptop the scam is used for all sorts of items all over the world. They don't care what you are selling. The whole point is to get you to ship it without laying so they can resell for cash
Yes.
The scammer will send you an email that looks like a PayPal email but it is fake. The email will state that the money is pending until you ship the item in question. However, as the email is fake, there is no money pending.
With Craigslist, only deal locally and in cash. The person who claims to be "out of town right now" is normally a scammer in West Africa. Also, scan his response for the word "item". The scammers usually send the same email to everyone. The scammer may not know (or even care) what is trying to scam you out of.
You deal with the buyer or seller face to face and with cash. If you agree to any other methods of payment, you will get scammed!
he'll send you fake mails intended to convince you payment has been made even though it has not. this s*** is all too common.
