Select “free stuff” as your chosen category on the drop-down list to see how lucky you might be. There may be free dirt, firewood–old or green (pre-cut or long pieces that you’ll have to take and cut later), rocks, scrap metal, furniture, garage sale leftovers, used lumber, etc. ; sometimes free stuff is left on the street curb for the taking and may be gone quickly.
A large number of ads have pictures, and so the search has a button so that you can limit your results to ads that include pictures. You can also limit your search to items between certain prices. Click “lowest price,” as a search setting, then $1 will lead the list, but some people put that to get you to click their listing which may contain mostly higher priced items.
Follow the seller’s instructions to the buyer such as instructing you to use the secure Craigslist email inquiry, or to call a phone number.
Protect your email address; be anonymous at first and be secure from spammers by creating a membership in Craigslist (if you wish); that way your email is not revealed at the first level of making an inquiry.
Agree when and where to pick up your purchase. Most sellers do not guarantee the product, and say it is “as is” and that sales are “final!”:
