Craigslist will add another category to its small list of paid-ad categories. According to Classified Intelligence Report, founder Craig Newmark announced last week that his small company would begin charging for listings in the rentals category at the New York Craigslist — though he didn’t give a date for implementation, nor a price point.
Newmark has been floating the idea of charging for NYC rental ads for
months, soliciting user feedback before making a decision. He’s
mentioned a price point of $10 previously.
Placing ads on Craigslist is completely free in all categories at most
of its 100-plus sites, but there’s a fee to place job listings on the
New York, San Francisco, and Los Angeles sites. Those paid categories
are enough to earn the company what’s been estimated at as much as $20
million in revenues in 2005.
The reason for the upcoming rentals-listing fee is to get that category
under control. Some apartment brokers have been repeating their
listings regularly to get them to the top of the queue. Newmark thinks
that a nominal fee will curb that practice and unclutter the category.
