Ask HN: What do people buy most on Craigslist? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: What do people buy most on Craigslist?

Working on a new idea and am not sure what most people buy on Craigslist. I use it for buying sports tickets, cheap/gently used furniture, and sometimes electronics, but do you think this is what most people use it for or am I missing big categories/products?

View on HN

The reason why craigslist is so successful is because people can buy anything depending on the need. So I am not sure if there is a way to quantify what people are buying "most". I would say "everything". Look at any "for sale" section. There are lot of ads on a daily basis. For example, I have bought furniture, laptops, cell phones, cars on craigslist but if I needed anything else, I would not hesitate. The only reason I don't buy on craigslist is if I need something new OR it is for my kids which I don't want used.

That's a major reason for craigslist's success but not the only reason. Clearly another is network effects. Given that, I wonder whether targeting the largest sales category is a good plan for a competitor -- surely it has to do with your goals, resources, etc., but imho it's worth considering that the best opportunity may be in the categories where craigslist facilitates the fewest sales.

I tend to think of Craigslist similar to digging for treasure. A lot of people are selling junk, but some people just need to get rid of their stuff quickly. For example, I got a great surfboard probably like $300 off the regular price because this guy wanted to get rid of it because his wife said the garage needed more space.

Personally, I tend to be a little more wary about electronics as I would like to test it thoroughly, and make sure it isn't stolen.

A friend of mine sold a bunch of building supplies, appliances and furnishings successfully on there, my sister sold a van, etc. Just about anything

You might be able to figure out what's popular by looking at the ads, the more polished ones are probably the ones folks have done repeat sales.

I dont know if cragslist has an api but if so you could compare states over two time periods and tally the products that have been removed.

Amazon has an api that you can narroq down to region, age, product, and more. This may have similar results as CL.

Kids toys and clothes. Lots of wooden train tracks and K'nex. There's a big second-hand market for kids' stuff as a lot of it is built to be indestructible, but it only gets used for a few years. And parents are cheap. Source: I yam one.

Idea: look at Craigslist for some big cities like NYC and see which categories have the most posts, and use that as a proxy for sales?

Cars are pretty huge. Toyotas and Hondas can get sold an hour after posting (I've witnessed it).

mobile Electronics (cell phones, tablets)are by far the most popular.

housing, cars, employment.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com