Flipper tactics?
 

So I put my car up on CL just to see if anyone from the Barrett Jackson thing was feeling loose with their money. I got 6 responses within the first 2 hours and then my ad got flagged and removed. I suspect one of the 4 confirmed flippers who responded flagged the ad to shut down more people from inquiring. Anyone else ever have this happen? I've since relisted it at 10% higher.

Very common for people to flag a car they think is a deal, so they can buy it. Even non-flippers do it.

did you list the car here on PP?
Share the link for us

One way to counter this is to game the flag:view ratio.
Post your link in OFF-TOPIC, and hopefully 250 guys click your ad
That may drown out the flag count.

Make an ad then delete it. wait a few hours and reinstate it, the deleted ad will always be there in blue in your account and you can just hit undelete whenever you get flagged. this way you don't have to make a new ad.

Flagging ads to buy a car would be very stupid, because the seller just makes a new ad and its rite to the top and sends out new notifications to people that are signed up for an ad with that car model.

Craigslist brings out the worst buyers when it comes to Aircooled Porsche’s.

It would be hard for one flipper to flag your ad. Takes a lot to actually get it taken down.

Similar caution is needed here and on Rennlist... There are at least 2 posters that say they are buying for themselves but are faux dealers. They buy or curb a car (with just a deposit) and then try to flip often to Europe or another, lesser followed site. Anytime you see "Wanted for my use" take a look at the prior postings.

Not really. If you know what you're doing you can single-handedly take down a CL post in a few minutes.

Do tell? Buying proxies? That or getting others to flag same post multiple times seem to be the easiest. I don’t see your average flipper going to all that trouble.

I'm hesitant to post a do-it-yourself guide to flagging CL posts but there is no need to buy proxies or ask people you know to flag the post. Not that tough to figure out and, obviously, flippers have as there are ads are disappearing.

Just post how to do it. That is the first step in trying to counter it

Not sure about CL, but I know not to expect much there. I have to say I've been a bit disgusted by what I've seen on Rennlist. I'd have to say that I've suspected the sellers have faux accounts or "friends" who participate in tactics to drive down prices on cars - so sellers can potentially buy it cheap themselves, or just to crap on their competition.

JrBoulder, instead of complain, why dont you list it on Pelikan?

I was hoping for a local deal, it looks much better in pictures than in person and I don't want to get into some big hassle with some sight-unseen buyer 2000 miles away. I'm working on an extensive collection of pictures for a Pelican listing this week.

Fixed it for you:D

Have you looked at the $/Euro exchange rate over the past year. Not nearly the number of cars headed back to Europe anymore.

That's not to say I don't agree with your point about people misrepresenting themselves when they're a buyer.