Was this person who wanted to buy our shelf a CF or AIBU?

[Kittypillar]

Tad weird but reckon my DH thinks I was a bit of stickler for this...

At the moment we've been having a massive clear out of stuff and my DH put a few things on FB marketplace. It wasn't much but the bits we thought would be a shame to chuck out completely. One of them was a bookshelf which we bought new a couple of years ago (think it was about £90ish) but now we've moved it's just the wrong shape for DH's office unfortunately.

So DH put it on sale for £24, not sure why he came to that amount (did point out it was a bit of a random figure but hey ho). Someone messaged him and said that yes they wanted it and asked when they could pick it up. DH said fine, gave them the address. Anyway, they turned up late so I was at home and DH wasn't, but I knew how much he'd agreed on. Turns out buyer had turned up at the house over an hour later than he said he would and without the right amount of cash. He sort of shrugged at me and went "oh sorry, I've only got £10 notes, so..." and trailed off expectantly

It was quite clear what he was hoping would happen, that I would say no worries and let him have it for £20. But I just felt so annoyed by it because it seemed so blatant. Maybe I'm just being a grumpy pregnant lady. So instead of saying fine, I smiled and said "oh no worries, there's a corner shop at the bottom of the street, will only take you 1 minute to get the right change!". He blinked at me and stammered a bit, then said okay and walked off. Funnily enough, he didn't come back...

DH has been finding flaky people on FB marketplace etc really irritating, so when I told him what happened, he seemed a bit exasperated that we still had this stupid bookshelf he just wants rid of! He wasn't angry, just you can tell he'd prefer it if I'd just said fine to the £20...

I personally think that buyer was a complete CF and knew exactly what he was trying to do. If he'd wanted to negotiate price, he could have said explicitly, or said so when he was chatting to my husband and agreeing to come and fetch it. AIBU for thinking that?

On another note, does anyone want a bookshelf?!

Trying it on. If I was picking something up from someone I wouldn't expect them to have change - they're not a shop - so I would have had the right money. I can see your DH's pov but I must admit it makes me smile to think of him having to go back home without the unit he was so sure he'd get for £20! My Dsis was selling a Mulberry handbag years ago, and this man contacted her, so desperate for it for his partner that he was willing to pay more than she was asking just to get her to remove the listing ... He wanted to pick it up in person and he would pay her then: I told her not to agree to this as he would surely start trying to chip her ... she offered to have it biked over to him as soon as he paid through Paypal: she never heard from him again!

Facebook is the worst place to do deals on. I find the people that buy (and sell) on Facebook marketplace to be absolute sh*tbags. I don't take of them seriously.

Absolutely @KurriKurri , in my DH's defence, it is a really nice mango wood bookshelf, I suppose he probably thought it was worth a bit of something to bother selling it. But if the buyer had felt it was a bit dear for what it was, he could have haggled with us. Like I said, I wouldn't have been opposed to him asking at all when he contacted DH.

Will definitely tell DH to make the price a bit more rounded next time, not entirely sure why he did that!

I've never heard of haggling a price before seeing the item. It's usual to strike up a bargain on seeing it and being face to face with the seller. That's my experience.

You're within your rights not to sell it for a lower offer though. I just think you made the wrong call in this instance for the sake of £4.

I would have graciously accepted the £30 - 24 for the book case and six quid for timewasting. CF arse.

@ILostInTheEarlyNineties If he'd actually asked me the question and been honest and polite about it, I probably would have agreed that £20 was totally fine. But he didn't. He quite clearly was chancing his arm and trying to make me feel cornered into letting him have it for less than agreed instead of just asking the question. Maybe it's petty of me but I was really annoyed by that - if he didn't want to pay the price he agreed initially with DH, he could have said so. It probably would have worked out for him if he'd just done that. He chose to be like that so I responded in kind. Honestly, I'm less annoyed with item still being in my house than I would have been if I'd let him get away with it when he was so blatant.

Well fair enough. He shot himself in the foot there by being overbearing and difficult. I hate bad manners so well done for refusing to sell for that principle.

@ILostItInTheEarlyNineties haha thank you :) chap did seem very surprised at my response, maybe that move has worked for him before and he was trying it again!

When I was selling my Phil and teds pushchair with accessories I had one CF come and have a look and then demand I knock nearly 25% off because it didn't have one particular accessory (which hadn't been listed in the advert anyway) and because the pushchair was red and she actually wanted green - the photos of it in the ad clearly weren't enough to alert her to this fact. I sent her away

We had this a few years back selling an old banger of a car. It went for £200 in the end on eBay. Price agreed in messages. All sorted. Until the day of sale the guy arrived with a tow truck and a man driving said tow truck and now wanted to pay £180 for the car. Ex FIL wouldn’t budge on the price even though he badly wanted rid of the shit heap on wheels in question. Would be buyer refused to back down either drove off. What was really surprising for me at least was the buyer did a 150 mile round trip and had fuck all to show for it, for the sake of 20 quid