Dear Colin,

If the seller is local to you, you can go over to his house and try the
radio for yourself. If the radio was well-taken-care-of, there should
be no problems.

Cigarette smoke does not cause any real damage to radios. The tobacco
odor will dissipate over several weeks and should be totally gone in a
year or less. If you're really concerned about the odor, leave the
radio outside for a few hours each day (in nice weather only!). That
should accelerate the dissipation of the odor.

Best,

Joe