We hear about these scams often, which usually involve an active or pending listing fraudulently advertised on another website (i.e., Craigslist, Facebook, etc.) at an attractive below-market rental price.
We are contacted by a consumer who wants to know more about the property that is “both for sale and for rent”. Sometimes, we are contacted by a frantic consumer who believes they rented the property (sight unseen), paid the 1st and last month rents by mail to the “owner”, and still needs to pick up the key. The scenarios vary, but one thing they all have in common is an unscrupulous individual or a group that is using the listing data to lure unsuspecting consumers into their scam in order to make a buck.
Although there is no magic bullet for resolving this issue, we do have some recommendations for anyone who would like to see these kinds of scams fail.
They are as follows:
- Run an Internet search on the property address of the property listing. Review property listings on these websites and see how the property information is displayed. Is the data displaying the same on various sites? If not, that is a red flag
- Setup a Google alert on the address of property to stay abreast of any fraudulent use of the property data. You will be notified by Google anytime the property address is added to a website and discovered through their search bots. You only need to do this once.
Consumers should always do their due diligence before sending money electronically or otherwise for the purchase or rental of real estate. When it comes to rentals, you should also be encouraged by the adage; "if it looks too good to be true, it probably is", which is still good advice today.
#rental #rental scams