How does escrow work?

[FocusMedia]

Hi, I was wondering how using a escrow works on a internet forum. I know how they work in real life with houses and stuff like that but I see people use it here too. Is there a company or a website that offers Bitcoin escrow?

[MA5H3D]

Basically, you find a member on the forum that both the buyer and the seller deem trustworthy and use him as an escrow. You could use something like blockchain.info's multi-signature escrow: https://blockchain.info/wallet/escrow and use a neutral forum member as the 3rd party.

[FocusMedia]

Oh I see, is there any fee you have to pay to use one.

[MA5H3D]

I suppose that depends on who you ask.

[Abdussamad]

The most famous escrow agent on this forum is john k. You can see his thread here:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=141672.0

Apart from that you can also try something like this:

http://www.bit2factor.org/

You don't need a third party if you go with the bit2factor but there are risks. Basically both the buyer and seller have to cooperate to release the bitcoins. So if the buyer pays the seller but the seller refuses to cooperate the coins are lost forever.