It seems there’s lots of people desperate to get their hands on unopened iPhones — even a couple of weeks before older models are outdated.
A couple of months ago I bought a 16-Gbyte iPhone at the Apple Store, thinking I’d upgrade from my original 8-Gbyte iPhone. But then rumors of the iPhone 2.0 started catching fire, so I didn’t open it. With the release of a 3G iPhone looking likely in early June, I thought it better to wait.
Trouble is, I waited too long to return the unopened iPhone to the Apple Store, which has a two-week return policy. So earlier this week, I put it on Craigslist for $550 ($50 over retail) and crossed my fingers.
Boy, was I surprised. I’ve had several offers, many of them for the inflated price. Most of these buyers asked me if I had more than one phone.
The first offer came in just a few seconds after I posted the ad. The buyer, who I’m meeting this afternoon, wrote: “I will need as many as you have. no receipt needed if you know what I mean.”
The iPhone must be headed overseas. Apple has a policy limiting sales to five iPhones per customer — checked against their credit card.
I’ll be asking the buyer some questions this afternoon about his interest in buying multiple, unopened iPhones.
Link to “iPhone wanted” ads on SF Craigslist.
Leander Kahney is the editor and publisher of Cult of Mac.
Leander is a longtime technology reporter and the author of six acclaimed books about Apple, including two New York Times bestsellers: Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple’s Greatest Products and Inside Steve’s Brain, a biography of Steve Jobs.
He’s also written a top-selling biography of Apple CEO Tim Cook and authored Cult of Mac and Cult of iPod, which both won prestigious design awards. Most recently, he was co-author of Cult of Mac, 2nd Edition.
Leander has been reporting about Apple and technology for nearly 30 years.
Before founding Cult of Mac as an independent publication, Leander was news editor at Wired.com, where he was responsible for the day-to-day running of the Wired.com website. He headed up a team of six section editors, a dozen reporters and a large pool of freelancers. Together the team produced a daily digest of stories about the impact of science and technology, and won several awards, including several Webby Awards, 2X Knight-Batten Awards for Innovation in Journalism and the 2010 MIN (Magazine Industry Newsletter) award for best blog, among others.
Before being promoted to news editor, Leander was Wired.com’s senior reporter, primarily covering Apple. During that time, Leander published a ton of scoops, including the first in-depth report about the development of the iPod. Leander attended almost every keynote speech and special product launch presented by Steve Jobs, including the historic launches of the iPhone and iPad. He also reported from almost every Macworld Expo in the late ’90s and early ‘2000s, including, sadly, the last shows in Boston, San Francisco and Tokyo. His reporting for Wired.com formed the basis of the first Cult of Mac book, and subsequently this website.
Before joining Wired, Leander was a senior reporter at the legendary MacWeek, the storied and long-running weekly that documented Apple and its community in the 1980s and ’90s.
Leander has written for Wired magazine (including the Issue 16.04 cover story about Steve Jobs’ leadership at Apple, entitled Evil/Genius), Scientific American, The Guardian, The Observer, The San Francisco Chronicle and many other publications.
Leander is an expert on:
Apple and Apple history
Steve Jobs, Jony Ive, Tim Cook and Apple leadership
Apple community
iPhone and iOS
iPad and iPadOS
Mac and macOS
Apple Watch and watchOS
Apple TV and tvOS
AirPods
Leander has a postgrad diploma in artificial intelligence from the University of Aberdeen, and a BSc (Hons) in experimental psychology from the University of Sussex.
He has a diploma in journalism from the UK’s National Council for the Training of Journalists.
Leander lives in San Francisco, California, and is married with four children. He’s an avid biker and has ridden in many long-distance bike events, including California’s legendary Death Ride.
You can find out more about Leander on LinkedIn and Facebook. You can follow him on X at @lkahney or Instagram.
4 responses to “Selling an iPhone on Craigslist — “No Receipt Needed, If You Know What I Mean””
I was in Shanghai, China last month, and iPhones were EVERYWHERE. And 8GB model sells for about USD$600. Since there’s no official channel for them, they all must have arrived via the methods you’re talking about.
I knew that gray market imports were happening, but there were SO many iPhones, it made me do a double-take when I thought about the scale on which it must be happening.
Methinks you won’t have trouble getting rid of yours! ;-)
Two things:
1) Craigslist often has scamers so watch yourself. Meeting with someone in person is a good idea, as long as it isn’t in a dark ally, if you know what I mean.
2) My German friends have been trying to get me to buy iPhones and ship them over there to be “jailbroken” and sold on German ebay for a profit. When one actually came to visit he bought three while he was here (one with a prepaid credit card).
“But Germany already has a legitimate supplier of iPhones!” I hear you cry. Well, in case you haven’t noticed, the USD is in the trash can right now; and that’s before I start using hyperbole. Also, due to excessive sales taxes and Apple execs denial of purchasing power parity the iPhone is WAY cheaper here.