I have read a series of messages from prospective sellers who have been contacted via email for various items they were selling, by apparently sellers who where local to them, (but just coincidentally happened to be out of the country at that precise moment, but desperately want the item and are willing to pay over and above the stated or requested amount) but are willing to send a cheque or bank draft for the item straight away.
There are a few hints immediately that this is a scam:
i) First off not many people use the word "bank draft" as a colloquial term, cheque in the UK and many english speaking countries, or check if in the US is preferred, "bank draft" is only used amongst banks or scammers (of course I am not trying to implicate the banks as scammers via their joint usage of this term with scammers).
ii) Regardless of what item is for sale, the buyer is curiously never interested in the description of the item, or indeed what the item is, further hinting that this is a template response.
What they are really interested in is that you give them your contact details, name, address, and phone number, they will arrange for a cheque or "bank draft" to be sent your way.
The cheque ofcourse will be an overpayment, and they may make an excuse right away, that you should send the overpayment as transport money to themselves, or a close associate to arrange to view/collect the item.
Of course no one is coming to view the item, they are simply trying to cover all avenues, by seeming like a legit buyer, the moment the seller sends the overpayment by an untraceable money transfer process such as Western Union, there is no need to contact the buyer again.
The victim may find that the cheque does clear, and for a few days or weeks everything may seem ok, but the chances are the cheque was obtained via phishing (obtaining login and financial information by pretense, I am sure you have seen and been sent a fake paypal payment email, this is a classic example of a phishing attempt).
Somewhere down the line, a hapless victim gave out their information, and that information was used to generate that fake cheque, sooner or later the hapless victim will contact his/her bank stating they did not authorize this payment, and the banks and police will contact whoever deposited that cheque to explain how they got a cheque paid into their account when the account owner did not authorize it. By then ofcourse the scammer is already on his next venture pretending to be another individual interested in buying another item, and possibly using the very same name, and address, the seller gave them as part of another elaborate email scam.
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