There is no buyer.
Notice how the scammer doesn't call what you are selling by name? He uses the generic word "item", that is because he sends the same stock copy/paste email to anyone selling everything that he can find and he has no idea what you are selling and doesn't care.
There is only a scammer trying to steal your possession, your electronic item, name brand clothing or jewelry.
The scammer isn't interested in your identity or bank account only in convincing you to ship your possession to him without him sending you a penny.
The next email will be from another of the scammer's fake names and free email addresses pretending to be "Paypal" saying "kindly send the tracking number and we will release the funds".
Paypal does NOT send such emails, ever. Paypal does NOT have escrow or money holding services like that scammer describes. Paypal does NOT demand you send a tracking number before money is sent. EVER. No exceptions.
Now that you have responded to a scammer, you are on his 'potential sucker' list, he will try again to separate you from your cash. He will send you more emails from his other free email addresses using another of his fake names with all kinds of stories of being the perfect buyer, great jobs, lottery winnings, millions in the bank and desperate, lonely, sexy singles. He will sell your email address to all his scamming buddies who will also send you dozens of fake emails all with the exact same goal, you sending them your cash via Western Union or moneygram.
You could post up the email address and the emails themselves that the scammer is using, it will help make your post more googlable for other suspicious potential victims to find when looking for information.
Do you know how to check the header of a received email? If not, you could google for information. Being able to read the header to determine the geographic location an email originated from will help you weed out the most obvious scams and scammers. Then delete and block that scammer. Don't bother to tell him that you know he is a scammer, it isn't worth your effort. He has one job in life, convincing victims to send him their hard-earned cash.
Whenever suspicious or just plain curious, google everything, website addresses, names used, companies mentioned, phone numbers given, all email addresses, even sentences from the emails as you might be unpleasantly surprised at what you find already posted online. You can also post/ask here and every scam-warner-anti-fraud-busting site you can find before taking a chance and losing money to a scammer.
If you google "cragislist buyer scam", "fake paypal email scam", "ebay escrow fraud" or something similar you will find hundreds of posts from victims and near victims of this type of scam.
Check out the one and only official paypal website, read up on what paypal does and how it really works.
100% SCAM
This article from back in 2008 explains how the scam works but people keep falling for it despite Craigslist very clearly warning people to ONLY deal with people they can meet face to face, NEVER give out Paypal details to anyone and AVOID all transactions involving shipping
http://consumerist.com/2008/10/how-a-nig...
Paypal prohibits ALL transactions with Nigeria due to fraud
Craigslist is for face to face CASH transactions only. NO exceptions or you will always get scammed
It kind of sounds like it might be. I would rather sell it to someone who could pick it up. If he pays you before you ship it then it's up to you if you want to sell it but if he pays you after he receives the thing, how do you know he will actually pay? Plus shipping costs money. I'd just sell it to someone who can pick it up or sell it on eBay
SCAM.
This is a very well known and well publicized scam. ANYTHING INVOLVING NIGERIA IS A SCAM.
Craigslist is meant for IN PERSON CASH SALES ONLY.
Forget it and you should know better.
I put an item up for sell on Craigslist and this guy from New York was interested and said that he wanted to buy it for his cousin that lives in Nigeria. I live in Idaho and he said for me to ship it to his cousin in Nigeria and he would pay me through pay pal. Should I do it or is it a scam?
