How do I stop spam calls after posting a Craigslist ad?

Where the calls came from

Craigslist masks your email behind a relay address and leaves the body of the ad alone. Anything you type into the description is on the page exactly as you wrote it, so a number you put there is public the moment the post goes live.

Software reads new listings too. It walks the fresh posts, pulls out anything shaped like a phone number, and keeps it. A number kept that way does not get forgotten when your item sells, which is why the calls outlast the ad.

Some of the callers are sales: agents, wholesalers, warranty pitches, solar, credit. Some are the opening move of a scam and want you on a longer call or on a different app. A few are people who genuinely want the couch. From the ringtone you cannot tell them apart, which is the whole nuisance.

What to do in the next ten minutes

• Stop answering numbers you do not know. A call that gets picked up can confirm to the system that a person is behind the line, and a confirmed line is thought to earn more calls. Let it go to voicemail; a buyer who wants the couch will leave one or text you.
• Turn on your carrier’s call screening. AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile each offer free spam-call screening in the United States. Look at your own carrier’s page for what the free tier does today and how to switch it on, because the names and the tiers keep changing.
• Silence unknown callers on the handset. iPhone has Silence Unknown Callers, which sends anyone not in your contacts or recent calls to voicemail. Most Android phones have an equivalent under the Phone app’s call-blocking or spam settings, named differently by each maker. It is blunt, and you can turn it off when the ad comes down.
• Edit the ad. Delete the post and repost it without the number, or take the number out of the description and let Craigslist’s email relay carry the replies. It does not erase the copies already taken, and it stops the next scraper finding anything.
• Never press a key to be removed from a list. On an automated call, a keypress or a spoken answer can confirm a live person to the system. The menu is not there to help you.

What barely helps, so you do not waste the afternoon

• Blocking each caller. The number on your screen is often forged, and the next call comes from a different one. Blocking a spoofed number blocks a stranger who has never called you. Do it if it makes the day better; do not expect it to end anything.
• The National Do Not Call Registry. It is free, it takes a minute, and it is worth doing. What it restrains is legitimate telemarketers, who obey it. The callers you are annoyed by are already ignoring the rules they are under.
• Asking to be taken off the list. On a scam call this tells the person they reached a human. On a legitimate sales call it usually works, which is why the two are worth telling apart before you speak.
• Changing your own mobile number. It works, and it is a week of your life: every bank, doctor, school and two-factor login you have. Keep it as the last resort, not the first.
• A call-blocking app that wants your contacts. Read what it does with the address book before you install it. You came here to give away less of your information, not more.

The next ad: what to put in the phone field

This is the part that decides whether you are here again in a month. The free options come first, because for most people one of them is the whole answer.

• No number at all. Craigslist’s email relay reaches you without showing anything, it costs nothing, and it is the right answer whenever every buyer you want will be on the site anyway. It stops being enough when a flyer, a window card or a forwarded screenshot is doing the selling.
• A Google Voice number. Free in the United States, and the most complete free option there is: a real number that takes calls, takes texts, does voicemail with a transcript, and rings through an app. You need a Google account and a U.S. phone number to link to it, and the number sits inside the same Google account as your mail. If you want a free number that rings, look here first and stop reading.
• A cheap prepaid SIM. A second number in the same handset or an old spare phone. It answers calls, it costs a plan every month, and it is one number for one person.
• A paid app number from Hushed or Burner. An app on your phone, carrying calls as well as texts, and the number is yours while you keep paying. Look at their own pages for what a period costs; we do not quote a rival’s price. Worth a look if you want a number that rings and would rather it were not attached to a Google account.
• A listing number from this site. Texts only, described in full below. It is the right tool if you want the ad answered by text and you want the number to stop reaching you afterwards, and the wrong tool if you want the phone to ring.

What a number from this site does, and what it will not do

TheLocalRing gives you one U.S. number, local to the ZIP code you enter, subject to what is in stock that day. You put it in the ad. Texts sent to it arrive in your email, in up to five inboxes at once, so two people can answer one listing without a shared login. You reply from your email and the reply goes back to the sender as an ordinary text from the listing number. There is no app to install and no second SIM.

Calls are the limit, and on a page about spam calls it deserves saying plainly: a U.S. number here does not forward calls on any plan. Somebody who dials it hears a short spoken message asking them to text instead, and nothing rings anywhere. If taking calls matters, Google Voice or a prepaid SIM is the better answer and we would rather you knew that before paying us anything.

It is receive-first. You can reply to anyone who has texted you in the last 30 days, and you cannot text somebody first. Your reply goes out as plain text every time, so you cannot send a photo of the item. A picture a buyer sends you may arrive; when it does, it reaches every inbox on the number as a link. Do not rely on it in either direction. There is no voicemail, and a reply longer than about 1,500 characters is cut short. The first reply each person gets carries a short label you choose, for example "Couch on 5th via TheLocalRing. Reply STOP to end.", so the relay is visible to them. We do not support verification codes: many banks, marketplaces and app signups refuse numbers like this one.

Passes run from C$2.99: C$2.99 for a day, C$5.99 for three days, or C$7.99 for a week. Monthly is C$14.99 a month and the first 14 days are free with a card at checkout. Prices in Canadian dollars. Your card issuer converts the charge and may add a foreign transaction fee.

When a pass ends, forwarding stops. The number is held for you for seven more days, then it goes back into a shared pool and may be assigned to somebody else. Your ad can outlive the pass, so a stranger texting that number weeks later reaches whoever holds it next. That is the trade: the number ending is the point, and Monthly is the answer if you want to keep it.

What to write in the ad next time

• Say the channel out loud: "Text only, please." A buyer who was told to text will text, and a dialler that only places calls gets nothing useful.
• Name the item on the same line as the number, so a message three weeks later still makes sense to you.
• Leave your email out of the description. Craigslist already relays it, and an address typed into the description is harvested the same way a number is.
• Take the ad down when the thing sells. It does not recall the scraped copies, and it stops new ones.

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