I once advertised an expensive Carl Zeiss binocular in a throw-away paper which had free ads.
A couple from around 120 miles away phoned, asked a lot of intelligent questions and said they would drive down and look at them. I told them I would be happy to meet them half way but they insisted.
Just before we were to meet, they phoned and asked if we could meet half way. We did and they turned out to be well known people who I would have known if they told me.
I did sell them and I figured they wanted to make sure of who I was before making the deal. That is why they insisted on getting my home address. They were no dummies.
Yup, in this day and computer age you can do lots of checking quick and free.