> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://tradepost.mintlify.site/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Offers

> Making and answering offers.

Making an offer posts a real comment, as you, in the listing's thread. The app
adds the ordering: offers on your listings appear here in order, alongside the
ones you have made on other people's.

The tab splits into **Open** and **Resolved** and opens on the live half.

## What an offer carries

| Part                            | Limit                                                                                 |
| ------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Items you want from the listing | Whatever it advertises                                                                |
| Items you are putting up        | Up to 10                                                                              |
| Cash                            | A number, and which side pays it. Absent where your subreddit has prices switched off |
| Message                         | 1,000 characters                                                                      |

**Cash goes either direction.** The form asks which side adds it.

Cash is recorded as text. Trade Post takes no payments and links to no payment
site.

## One offer at a time

You can hold **one open offer per listing**. A second is refused: change or
withdraw the one you have first.

Declining or retracting frees the slot. Accepting keeps it.

The listing's own offer bar tells you where yours stands without opening the hub,
and turns into **Open your offer**.

## States

| State      | Who sets it            | Terminal |
| ---------- | ---------------------- | -------- |
| New        | Arrives with the offer | No       |
| Discussing | The lister             | No       |
| Accepted   | Whoever's move it is   | Yes      |
| Declined   | The lister             | Yes      |
| Retracted  | The offerer            | Yes      |

**Discussing is the lister ordering their own inbox.** It posts nothing and the
offerer never sees it.

**Either side can accept** when it is their move. **Only the lister can
decline**, and they can do it at any time, whoever's move it is.

Terminal means final. A declined offer cannot be reopened and an accepted one
cannot be declined. Making a new offer is what replaces any of them.

## Countering

Either side can counter, up to six rounds. Every round is a permanent public
reply.

At six rounds the **Counter** button disappears. **Accept**, **Decline** and
**Retract** all stay live. Carry on in the thread, or retract and make a fresh
offer.

The button is also absent when it is not your move. The app says which of those
it is.

A counter can drop items or add them. **A lister countering can only add items
the offerer has on a live listing post, and only where the subreddit publishes
inventories.** Where it does not, or where the offerer has nothing posted, a
lister can drop staked items but not add to them.

## Taking one back

**Retract** is yours until the lister accepts. It releases your slot on the
listing and leaves the negotiation thread standing. Deleting your own comment
does not.

Once an offer is accepted there is no retracting it. The way out is backing out
of the [trade](/traders/trades), which is a different act with a different cost.

## What the other side sees

Accepting, declining and retracting each post a reply in the thread, as you.
Reddit asks permission the first time, the same way it does for a listing.

Marking an offer as discussing posts nothing.

## Notes

* **An offer expires after 30 days**, fixed from when it was made and never
  extended by activity. It is the shortest record in the app after your saved
  details. See [what is kept](/traders/what-we-keep).
* **You can only stake available items.** Anything traded or held by an open
  trade is left out.
* **An offer with nothing on your side is refused.** Items, cash, or both.
* **There is no in-app messaging.** The comment thread is the conversation, and
  every row has a **Thread** link to it.
* **Accepting starts a [trade](/traders/trades)** and holds both sides' items.

<Warning>
  **A deleted offer comment takes the offer with it.** A moderator removing the
  comment counts as deleting it, and approving it back does not return the offer
  to the lister's inbox. Prefer a reply over a removal on an offer comment you
  want to keep.
</Warning>