My fiancee and I are looking for an apartment (we have around ten days to find a place and move out. Not fun) and I saw an ad on Craigslist for a place under what we are willing to spend in a nice part of town. For anyone familiar with Santa Barbara it is by the mission, which concerned me because I’d assume houses by there are pretty expensive, and they were only wanting 1500 a month. Anywho, I emailed asking for more information. This is what I got back:
All I did was ask for basic information and she is already pleading me not to break the trust she has placed in me. OTOH, she did ask God to bless me, so chances are she’s on the up and up.
Around here I know a small number of people who live in gorgeous expensive houses rent free, they are “housesitters”. For some the stay can last for a couple of years. The owners are wealthy and are living at one of their other homes, they just want someone to be a warm body in their house while they are not there. Keep and eye on things, y’know. It’s a great gig if you can get it.
This one you are looking at sounds like it’s in the same general ballpark.
I hate when that happens. You move overseas to do missionary work (and hopefully not teach English) and then :smack: realize you just ran off and left your house completely vacant for 2-3 years!
This sounds like a sweet deal though. Subscription-free “facilities” and electronics?! And not just any DVD player but a SONY DVD player! Plus, no crappy stove for you, but a genuine British four-hob!
No, really, this is a scam that is all over Craigslist. Do your acquaintances usually turn their homes over to people from Craigslist, sight unseen, or do they perhaps ask for references and interview them first?
Google tells me that 2128 Emerson Ave., Santa Barbara is currently listed for $869,000 with Nell Eakin Realty (fifth listingdown, bottom of the page). I think $1500 a month is a little low, but I don’t know property values out there. I suggest you call Ms. Eakin at (805) 455-9376 and ask her if the owners are indeed in Nigeria. She looks like a friendly sort.
Personally, I think i’m gonna move to Nigeria and open a perfectly legal business. Something sure fire. Like an Internet café or perhaps a mail order bride service.
I vote for scam. Here are 2 newsarticles on craigslist aparment scams.
My partner just got a job in Pensacola and we have been looking for apartments. He just signed a rental agreement yesterday. Pensacola’s craiglist is full of scams. One scam involves an ad for a nice apartment, at an unbelievably low rate. No address is included. Upon emailing an inquiry you get back this response:
Too many scammers on craigslist.
Need your social security number and dob to do a credit check.
Will contact you after you’ve qualified.
I don’t remember all the variations of scams that my SO encountered. But I do recall one that sounded similar to the situation you are describing.
I know! As soon as I saw the word “Nigeria,” I was done. The use of the term “four-hob,” awkward syntax, random capitalization of “Internet Access,” and request for a picture of the tenant did little to assuage my suspicions.
I presume the photo is to make some sort of fake ID: passport, driving license?
Having said that, many years ago, I was driving down Highway 101, and we wanted to stay in La Jolla. We stopped at a real estate agent to ask if he knew anywhere nice (as you do), and he told us that he had a beachside condo for sale, and that the owners wanted to someone to stay in it, for free, so it seemed still occupied. We had to leave an imprint of our credit card, to show people around, and be nice about the place. Not hard: it was beautiful. We stayed about two months.
I’ve no idea if that sort of practice is commonplace in the States.
Why oh why do they always overreach? It’s not like I want scammers to get smarter, but don’t they know how much more plausible these things would be if they bumped up the rent a bit and didn’t insist on including all the bells and home alarm/two parking spot/12 walk-in closet whistles? I suppose it’s best for everyone, though. Just pausing and recalling ‘If it’s too good to be true…’ would kill 99 percent of these deals.
You can do a couple of things to check and see what’s up…
You can (I assume you live very close to there), drive by and see what is up… if there is a family in there, you know straight up that this is BS.
You can also go to the local courthouse and look up the address and see who is on the title. If the names don’t match up, you have been the victim of an attempted scam and you should contact whoever let them post the ad to begin with.
I nearly fell victim to a similar one myself last year - mentioned in a similar thread today - they wanted one month’s rent as a deposit, then they’d send me the keys just to inspect the premises. I went round to look at the property from the outside, because it was in the next street. The property being advertised was an apartment; the actual address was a non-divided house.
Don’t even bother doing any research. This is NOT normal landlord behaviour. It is a scam and it’s being perpetrated remotely. The reason they mention missionary work? In case of an IP address check.
Yep. Stay far, far away from anything associated with Nigeria. Period.
As a side note while we are talking about Nigeria, I was pleased that in the new film District 9 (which takes place in South Africa) shortly after aliens made first contact with Earth, it was the Nigerians who found a way to hustle them for profit (The “cat-food scam”). I found that part incredibly realistic.