Avoid “Too Good To Be True” Rental Home Scams

A lot of buyers are discouraged by the competitive real estate market and are electing to rent instead of buy a home.  Be careful of this clever scam that my seller and I experienced recently.

My seller had health issues and had to sell her home to move closer to family.  Within hours of entering her home for sale in the MLS, I started getting phone calls from people interested in my seller’s home.  But, they were not interested in purchasing it.  They were interested in renting it for a “too good to be true” rent of just $800 a month.  I asked how they thought they were going to rent my seller’s 1,200 square foot, 3 bedroom, 2 bath home for $800 a month.  They said they saw an ad in Craigslist with pictures and full contact information for just that.  They questioned why the seller was trying to rent and sell her home at the same time.

I was curious so I looked up this ad on Craigslist.  The bogus ad poster said the Army was deploying her to Afghanistan on short notice.  She asked that interested parties contact her directly since she was still working on getting a property management company lined up.  Her bogus contact email used my seller’s legal name so it sounded pseudo legitimate [email protected] (legal names of property owners are readily available in public records).  The fraudster said she can reserve the home if interested parties will send her a $500 deposit and fill out an application form.  The Craigslist ad had beautiful pictures of my seller’s home (They copy and pasted my MLS listing pictures and used them in the Craigslist ad).

I got several phone calls a day from people interested in renting my seller’s home.  This was going to be a huge problem.  I told these unsuspecting families to not send a $500 deposit to this fraudster.  They would never get their money back.

I contacted the local police department and asked if they could do anything.  They said they were overwhelmed and could not act until anyone was actually suckered out of their $500 deposit money.

There is a saying, “If it sounds too good to be true…”  Anyway, be careful of this scam.  Fraudsters can be amazingly clever.