That $60 dehumidifier I bought off Facebook Marketplace...

I found this dehumidifier listed for 60 bucks, looked clean in the photos, guy said it worked great. Drove 45 minutes to pick it up, got it home, plugged it in and it barely pulled any water out of the air after three days. I thought maybe it was just old and slow, but then I read online that some people refill those units with R-410A refrigerant on their own. Turns out the coils were probably shot or it was low on gas, and fixing it would cost more than a new one. So I basically paid 60 bucks to haul someone's trash to my basement and waste an afternoon. Has anyone else gotten burned on a used appliance that looked fine but was secretly broken?

3 comments

3 Comments

charles6781mo ago

Oh man, that's the classic Facebook Marketplace special right there. You paid 60 bucks for a boat anchor with a fan attached. I swear half the stuff on there is just people testing how far you'll drive before you realize you got hosed. At least you can use it as a really expensive paperweight now.

vera_lewis1mo ago

I mean, is it really that big of a deal though? People mess up on Marketplace all the time, it's not like it's a scam or anything. 60 bucks is barely dinner for two these days, so it's not the end of the world. Maybe the guy just didn't know what he was selling, you know? I've been burned before on stuff that looked fine in the pictures, it happens.

charlie_allen24d ago

The price doesn't really matter when the principle is the same though. I read this article a few weeks back about how Marketplace is basically becoming a dumping ground for broken stuff people are too lazy to throw away themselves. That whole "he didn't know what he was selling" excuse wears thin after the fifth time you buy a "gaming PC" that turns out to be a Dell office computer from 2012. Arriving to find something straight up non-functional is a completely different ballgame than getting something that just looks a bit rougher than the pictures. There's a difference between being a casual seller and knowingly offloading junk that doesn't work at all.