I voted 150+ for both. It weeds out people who aren’t serious about pet ownership. If you can’t afford that, you can’t afford to feed / care for the animal anyway.
I’m not sure that I’d spend $150+ for a rehoming fee on a random cat, unless the person had vet bills showing that it had been fixed, was current on its shots, and possibly had been chipped. Otherwise, I’m likely to think that the person offering the animal is trying to gouge me, not that s/he’s trying to ensure that the animal will go to a good home.
Now, the last time I took in a cat, I spent about $500 within a month or so of adopting her, because of getting her spayed, chipped, vaccinated, and a few other medical problems. For instance, she has a bump on the back of her head, and I asked the vet to go ahead and Xray it while she was asleep during the spaying operation. She had worms, and fleas, and I had to get those eliminated. Adopting a pet isn’t cheap.
I’d be OK with someone wanting to know the name of my current vet, who will be happy to proclaim that I do, in fact, take good care of my pets.
Seriously? I can easily afford to feed and otherwise take care of my dogs, and my entire household makes just over $30,000. There’s no way I would have $150 of extra money just lying around.
Really? You’ll spend thousands on a dog over its life. If people are adding all this up and trying to sell a dog for that price, are they successful?
In my local Craigslist I saw a dog listed who wasn’t housebroken (they had tried repeatedly and failed), wasn’t neutered, has valley fever and required daily medication, has bitten children, digs, and wasn’t up to date on shots. They wanted $100 for him.
Considering I would need to pay for the neutering, shots, medication and work with that pup extensively to help his bad habits, I think FREE is the only real option.
I can’t thank you enough. I was coming here to say the same thing. I work in a lab and the beagles are purpose-bred from Harlan and and extensively health-screened. In most cases, they would be practically useless for research if they were not.
Nobody’s collecting stray dogs and selling them off to the Bad Scientists who are going to do horrible, evil experiments on them because they enjoy watching animals suffer.
Craigslist usually asks for rehoming fees for pets to help ensure that the prospective adopter is truly serious about taking in the pet.
I won’t speculate on what the adoption fee “should” be for dogs because I know very little about their care & feeding.
However, I’ve been looking for a kitty on Craigslist lately (and found a real winner, thank you!) and came to the conclusion that anything up to $100 is reasonable for a kitten that has been altered/has its shots/is chipped, etc. because that is what most shelters charge. All those things cost money and to have them already taken care of gets you off to a good start. (I’m getting a 9-week old kitten from someone who adopted him at a shelter only to find out she was allergic–she’s asking $75 and he’s had all that done.)
However, the fee should be quite a bit less for an unaltered cat/kitten, one that hasn’t been to the vet, etc. because the person adopting it will have to have the funds to take care of those things. That being said, it is still wise to charge at least $10-25, to weed out the flakes and ne’er-do-well’s. An older cat should come with a lower fee as well, as it may require extra care and of course will have a shorter life span with its new person.
If you want to give kittens away for free–or even if you charge an adoption fee–be VERY careful who you give them to. I did that a couple times, and encountered one pair of bad apples. Fortunately I seem to have a “psychic link” with cats–or some of them anyway. Soon after I had given Sammy-Jo to these fellows, I had a dream that she walked all the way home - more than 5 miles–because they were mistreating her. Luckily they’d given us their phone number & address so we could check up on her. We paid them a visit, found out they’d given her to a neighbour because she “scratched/bit them.” I knew that kitten wouldn’t have scratched ANYONE without a good reason! Then their neighbour had let her get lost on the streets–so we had to go rescue her and ended up keeping her (which was fine by me!). Tell potential adopters if they dont’ want the pet for ANY reason for goodness’ sake, give it back before letting it loose! Sheesh!
Another problem with giving away animals for free on craigslist: They could be used as bait animals for dog fighting. The responsible thing to do is to charge a fee to try to weed out people who have bad intentions.
As for the fee to charge, I think it really depends on the animal. An old mixed breed dog, maybe $25. For a cat…well, around here the cat overpopulation problem is absolutely ridiculous and maybe $10 would be justified. If it’s a young animal of a breed that’s very popular (like a golden retriever or poodle) you would probably be justified in charging several hundred dollars.
One of my friends posted a story on Facebook about an isolated incident where people collected free cats & dogs on CL and used them as live target practice. I don’t know if it is true or not, but the fact that it names a specific place made me think it was real. That alone is a good enough reason to charge a small re homing fee to weed out people who want free pets for bad things.
I got 2 of my pets from shelters and the cat was $125 (neutered, shots, chipped) and the dog was $350 (same neuter/shots/chip). One of my cats was found and I paid for neuter/shots/chip myself and it was ~$300.
I paid a $250.00 adoption fee for my dog, but she came from a rescue organization and they’d provided major life saving surgery before making her available. On the other hand, if I ever wanted a cat I would just go cruise through a mobile home park and grab a kitten from out of the scrabble.
I would say up to 500 dollars might be fair.
It’s not just PeTA that advises against giving away pets on craigslist. Most animal welfare organizations advise against it. There are some pretty messed up people who scour “free-to-good-home” classified ads looking for animals they can use for, well, not very nice things.
As for how much to charge as a re-homing fee, I think that in most cases, a fee comparable to what is charged by the local Humane Society-type shelter is reasonable.
Re-homing fees can be increased or reduced depending on factors such as the age of the animal, its breed, level of training, etc. I would consider not charging a re-homing fee in the case of a pet with ongoing medical issues (for example, thyroid supplementation), but only if the potential adopter had excellent veterinary and personal references.
Honestly I disagree i have never paid over 60.00 for any of my dogs and never over 20.00 for my cats, i cant afford to pay large rehoming fee because i always spay/ neuture, micro chip, licence, all shots, and buy them a good harness and toys, food treats ect
I’m in agreement with these posts. If people want to include a fee for the purpose of weeding out potential pet owners the money should be going towards the pet in someway. Otherwise they could just be honest and let you know they are selling you the animal for their own profit. If someone wants to sell their pet they are more than welcome to just don’t try to dress it up as something else.
I actually got my dog, free, off Kijiji. The owners had bought the pup from a breeder for considerable money. I was looking at Kijiji before posting something for sale and was interested in traffic. I was looking under pets to see how fast things moved. And I was stunned to see how much people were asking for dogs, though many were specific breeds. Then I came upon a dog that was free and checked him out, then carried on surfing through dogs that cost as much as $600!
A few minutes later I went to my hubby and told him I felt bad for this dog 'cause he was free! (I had lost my husky a couple of years earlier, he tried to tempt me into another dog, but it took a long time for me to be ready!) his response, without looking up was, “what are you going to do about it?” I went back to my computer and composed an email and sat staring at it for some time. In comes hubby and repeats his question! So I hit send!
Owner told me she didn’t want money to be the deciding factor! Came to my house to see my yard, that I had a crate, (which I never used!), etc. I waited a weekend while she saw other applicants. But every time we spoke I told her I felt this dog was meant for me!
And he is a sparkling beauty, the happiest animal I’ve ever known. When his hair gets long he looks like every mutt from a children’s book, kids love him. He literally makes people smile, I swear, I see them grinning whenever we cross streets etc. He’s astoundingly awesome in every way! But we could never have afforded to pay what they did for him.
One parent was a registered show dog poodle the other a winning trials retriever, I know because the breeder called me, stunned to learn the purchasers had given him to me!
I don’t see why the vet voucher system isn’t automatic. The owner doesn’t profit from someone actually doing them a favor by taking the animal off their hands, the new owner is demonstrably willing to sacrifice for the pet’s care, and the pet gets the money.
The fee should be enough to reimburse the original owner for initial de sexing and puppy/kitten vaccinations. I said 50-100 assuming that’s about what those fees would be.
What, you decided not to read the links Lynn provided? It’s not the source for a majority of research animals, but it absolutely does happen, is fully documented, and is even government-regulated (poorly, according to one of those links).
I realize you don’t want people to think it happens, but that’s immaterial to the fact that it does.
I’d charge a decent sized fee, refundable in three months when I see the animal healthy and happy in it’s new home. I wouldn’t advertise that, but if I got a good vibe from the new owner, that would be the deal.
I haven’t seen any mention yet in this thread about sick fucks using free pets as bait animals for training fighting dogs.
Closer to $200 to $300.