I ran into a silly-good deal on another board... but there are several red flags I'm trying to mitigate / protect against.
- brand new account / no feedback
- smok'n deal

I want to make sure none of these come to pass
- item is stolen
- I wind up as a robbery statistic

Is there any way to run a SN without running it through an FFL? (at the very least they'd have positive ID on the seller)
I'm thinking a pic of their permit/license with their thumb over the address, but showing the #
Of course, neutral, safe trade location & time.

Maybe I'll just try talking them into selling it at normal price to someone else.

edit - rofl.. now the location went from Atlanta to Augusta. (after they asked where I was)

edit 2 - ok - it's almost certainly a scam now. They want to ship it to my FFL, and expect payment when they provide me with a tracking number.

Sound like a scam to me.

Is this on the ODT? you need to report it to the moderators.

Which moderator? I don't see any specifically linked to any forums.
I've already PM'd one of them - may need to spam a few more.
Found another one that smelled the same. The guy pursuing it had a very, very parallel experience.

edit - - -
Well paint me silver and call me Sally - there IS a report button over there!
Admins are aware.

You report a thread by clicking on the small black triangle with the exclamation mark (!).  It alert one or more mods.  You can write a short explanation, like "suspected scammer".

That's funny - when I saw it over there, it was the word Report in the bottom left of the post.

Who'da thunk a $500 M18 or $950 AXG Scorpion would be bogus.

A couple weeks ago there was an ad for a Beretta 92 Compact that had a very reasonable price, not outrageously low but decent price.  People started posting replies like, I'll take it, Is this still available, etc.  No answer from the seller.  Some sent private messages but they didn't get any response either.  That lack of response from the seller turned people off and they started questioning the legitimacy of the ad.  It was then marked sold.

I've been in one like that. Legit sale, the guy just didn't spend much time on ODT. It took him a month or so to mark the add and give feedback.

I'd much rather be in limbo than be asked to send money for a tracking number. I wonder how many other people were trying to buy these, and if they had any other ads up.

I had a very similar experience, seller had registered two days before PM'ing me, no track record, kind of dodgy when I asked for PayPal, wanted a credit card - I ejected and politely declined.

I have only been on for about a year and didn't really have a track record of trades myself, but there are warning signs

If I ever get a sketchy vibe on ODT, I always propose a local police dept parking lot as the meeting place. Tends to weed out shady characters and in my experience PD’s don’t mind you using their parking lots for transactions, some even encourage it.