OK, a heads-up about MY experiences on Craigslist:
1. I answered TWO ads where the "homeowner" was gone, as a missionary to the unenlightened. "They," the designated rental agents/whatever, would be happy to show and/or rent to me. Yepperoni, I'll just bet they would. Even I, not the brightest light on the tree can smell a rat. I smelled "rental agents" collecting money from ME, for a house they did not own, nor were authorized to rent. Ya see, there were a lot of ads like that. Odd that.
The next one I answered was from a lady who talked, and talked, and whined, and complained about former tenants, then decided at my advanced age, I might not be able to finish off the attic of somewhere (not in the ad), nor shovel a half mile of snow to get to the place. Give that woman a star, and a bill for my cell phone.
The next one was a tiny place, quite a ways away. Not sure if that was okay or not, but I did wonder why all the negatives. Someone wanting to rent will usually stress the positives. Hell, if the owner didn't even like the place, I wasn't quite desperate enough (if that's what he was looking for) to bother looking.
The last one was the kicker. It was an ad for a nice, decent sized, priced right apartment in Amish country. I called the guy, we talked, laughed, no, I don't have any pets, I could rent right away, yada, yada, everything was cool - meet him there at 7:30 PM. That threw me for a bit of a loop. I didn't know the area well, even though it wasn't that far from my "little stone cottage", and 7:30 struck me as an odd time to see the place. At any rate, I asked me son to come along - I felt a bit uncomfortable.
So, sonny and I drive over the river, through the woods, farmland, back roads, and goat tracks to get there - we used his GPS. We arrive a little early since being late is not good. We got there before the owner/renter, and met a young man who rented the other half of the house. He told us the owner/renter was at a Bible study (DOES ANYONE NOTICE HOW OFTEN RELIGION/CHURCH ENTERS INTO THESE THINGS? I DO). At any rate, the owner/renter finally shows up and he was not the sweet, laughing guy I had spoken to on the phone. He took one look at us, probably my son who is very fit since he uses the body-building equipment provided by jail, and was not interested, even though I provided him with financial documents proving my stability.
The upshot here is, I called and called about the place, I really needed to get away from the "little stone cottage", for my own sake. Finally, this owner/renter sent back my rental application, along with my check for running my credit. He never ran my credit. Hmmm.
I believe I MAY have escaped something rather unpleasant by bringing my son with me. No, I didn't get to rent the half house/apartment, but I really believe I escaped harm of some sort.
I've had it with Craigslist. I no longer feel safe doing business of any sort on there, I've seen too much in the news, and have my own bad vibes about the place.
My own opinion, of couse.