I Don't Like Mondays But I Do Like

 NOT FALLING FOR SCAMS!!!


I'm attempting to sell my BRAND NEW laptop over the internet.  Why lie, I want a Mac.  I put my ad up on a local classified website and waited....I've never sold anything on the internet before.  I was so excited when only a day later I received an email urging me to take down the post because they were incredibly interested and would purchase right away.  I immediately emailed back my asking price and received a request to ship the laptop to a "cousin living abroad."  The interested party would pay $100 over my asking price and wire the money "directly into my paypal account after shipping through DHL." 

I Googled DHL and was instantly warned that many con artists request shipping through DHL and promise wiring money when in fact the laptop gets shipped who knows where and you get no money and...no laptop. 

The gods of Wikipedia also let me know:

"...popular online classifieds websites [have] been plagued with scammers using advance-fee fraud and similar techniques, usually involving fake checks, to con people out of their money. Sometimes many scammers contact a person who is either attempting to buy or sell items on Craigslist, and attempt to perpetrate the exact same scam...sending realistic looking bank checks, sending more money than is owed, and requesting that money be wired back to the scammer.^[41][42]
Another advance-fee method that has been used recently on Craigslist is where the scammer will contact someone selling an item and ask them to ship the item to a location outside the US, then provide the tracking number for the shipped item in exchange for payment. The seller then sends the item and provides the tracking number, after which the scammer never provides payment."

Bummer.  Be careful out there on the internet...but anyone else can still buy my laptop.  As long as you're not a con artist. 

Rude.