SPOKANE, Wash. -- Spokane County sheriff's detectives are trying to find a man who allegedly offered to sell his son on Craigslist for $5,000, KXLY-TV reported.

Investigators believe the ad is not a hoax and have gotten a search warrant to find the person who posted the ad in February.

In the posting, the father identified himself as a single parent named Rick who ran out of child care options. His posting started out by saying that "Gavin is a great kid but I can no longer afford to take care of him."

Rick said his 4-year-old "loves playing with balls but doesn't really like to play with cars and refuses to eat vegetables." Rick also wrote that "he doesn't fuss very much but when he does he just screams for hours. I usually just put him in the closet until he stops and that usually works."

Detectives were alerted to the posting by a Spokane Valley woman, who copied the ad and sent it to the sheriff's office. Detectives said the ad was only up for a short time on Craigslist.