adoption fee v2

The thing that bothers me most is the adoption fee for ensuring a good home. We all understand the fee for vet bills etc. The ensuring a good home fee is ridiculous. How would charging a fee for them to take ur animal give you ensurance that they know about the animal know how to care or know their financially fit to take care of the animal just because they dish out a one time payment. Here is a thought


Instead of charging an ensuring a good home fee why don't you really stop lying yourself and charge a food/needs fee.

Make them buy what the animal needs and show you it (if not local send pictures with a piece of paper with their name and information on it) if local go to their house check their set up. Make them show you a reciept for food and accessories such as hides lamps bulbs enclosure.

Sorry just had to rant

Trust me most of the time they aren't charging to ensure a good home, that's just what they want you to think. It's for the $$$.

when I was adopting out kittens that were born to a stray I took in, I put an 'adoption fee to ensure good home'. Basically it stops the impulse 'it's free! i'll get it' people. When the people came to get their kittens, I told them to keep the money and use it for the cat (one couple insisted on me taking it anyways).

Sometimes it's about greed and sometimes it is about trying to weed out the impulse buyers.

I agree with April that a modest fee will weed out impulse adopters. And Dustin that is a great idea on having potential adopters but stuff and show it. But I think Christina is right, a lot of times it is a disguised sale and all about the money. Sometimes I'll see fees as high as $1,000 'to ensure a good home'. Yeah right.

It's the Craigslist mentality at work...animal sales are not allowed, but adoption fees are. That's why the term has gone from the old version (vet bills and related care charges) to the new version (full retail price).
I agree with April, in that a modest adoption fee will deter many of the impulse buyers; and with the OP, who recognized that the idea of said fee (even at full retail) does nothing to ensure a good home.

Biggest clue (aside from the prices) - look at the contact information, if it is a posted ad.
"three 4 two 5 eight twenty seven" or "maldesto4 at the y" type listings are classic CL.
I always get a kick out of people doing that stuff here, and posting full price adoption fees...sometimes I just can't help but post a quick message that this isn't CL, and that they should just say they are selling their animal...and posting their contact information is allowed.

Originally Posted by hhmoore

It's the Craigslist mentality at work..- look at the contact information, if it is a posted ad.
"three 4 two 5 eight twenty seven" or "maldesto4 at the y" type listings are classic CL...and posting their contact information is allowed.

I think you may be misinterpreting the rationale behind dsiguising the phone number and email address. I'm thinking it's more an issue of trying to avoid spam by tricking any automated contact info collection bots that may be lurkign about. Having done my fair share of business on CL, and having dealt with some real...characters, I'm amazed that so many people continue to post their phone number so freely in that particular forum.

I'm guessing that this thread is in reference to a post here on Fauna, though? In which case it doesn't make much sense to try to hide intent to sell behind catagorizing the sale as an adoption. Gotta love it when someone posts ads without having the decency to even take a look around and see what the site is all about.

I'm not unaware of that rationale....but, for whatever reason, I did think it was against their rules to post direct contact info. Don't mind being wrong on that - I think I've looked at CL maybe a dozen times over the years.
Maybe they just recommend against it?

As far as I know, it's SOP to post any contact info you want to on CL. There's even a little button you can click on to send someone a note just in case they didn't leave any way to get in touch.