Okay, I have posted an add on Craigslist about several rooms in my house that are for rent. I have received several responses from people with their telephone numbers included, asking me to call them.
This seems really odd to me,and I would say there is some kind of scam involved, except I’m not sure how they would profit from me just calling them. One name sounded vaguely African, and was a Hotmail address. The other e-mail came from Russia (.ru), both well-known places for con-artists to set up shop. The phone numbers all have local exhanges though.
So, I guess I’m wondering if anyone else has ever received responses asking for them to make a call to a potential renter like this. I haven’t called anyone, and I probably won’t, but it just seemed strange enough to ask around about.
What you will probably get is an offer from them to pay three to six months rent upfront, with safety deposit of course. They will send you an authentic looking cashiers check for the correct amount plus one or two thousand dollars extra which you will wire back to them. The bank you take the check to will honor the check…for maybe a week. Then you will get a notice from the bank that the check was fake, and you owe them the entire amount, plus fees and interest.
Czarcasm, I’ve heard of those scams, but I’ve never heard of that method being used on landlords. I guess anything’s possible. But how do they get phone numbers with local exchanges?
Perhaps they’re foreign exchange students and still use their overseas e-mail accounts? A woman of my acquaintance uses an e-mail account from a job she left 3 years ago.
What’s the big deal? Some people prefer to be contacted by phone. Maybe they don’t have easy access to the internet. If you don’t want to call them then just reply via email. I don’t see any reason to get suspicious about anything.
Well, the history of landlords asking to be contacted by email is pretty brief, so I don’t think you can cite precedent. If I were trying to get an apartment, I’d include my phone number in the response and hope the landlord called me back. The next step is usually to set up an appointment, and that’s usually easier by phone than by email tag.
That said, be alert for scammers. Not because they ask you to call, which could be normal human behavior, but because these addresses are odd for someone trying to rent locally and there is a common scam that **Czarcasm ** mentioned. We’ve had some lively threads on it in the past, IIRC.
Be suspicious. I work in a property management office, and get these emails with some regularity. I can usually tell who’s just a dippy local with casual email habits versus the overseas scam artists.
Usually I just give one quick, polite reply advising 1) the information they are asking about is in the ad 2) we don’t rent sight unseen, ever and 3) we have a full application process they will need to complete after they’ve viewed the rental unit in person.
Why do you owe the bank for the check? Wouldn’t they just tell you it’s invalid and not credit the money to your account? How does one determine if a check is valid or not.
You sell the item for say $8,000. The scammer gives you a $10,000 check.
You deposit it and the bank credits you $10,000.
You give the scammer $2,000 plus the item you are selling.
The check bounces.
The bank debits your account $10,000
You are now out the price of the item, PLUS $2,000.
Now can you see the problem?
You are responsible for a checks validity. If you present a check to your bank and they cash it for you then subsequently they find out the check is no good they will hold you responsible and deduct the amount from your account. If you don’t have enough they will sue for the balance. A checks validity is determined when it is presented to the issuer and they pay it.
Just because they e-mailed you doesn’t mean they have “easy” access to the Internet. Anyone can hop on a library computer for 30 minutes to check their email and send a couple of messages out. What if they can’t get to a computer on certain days? What if they just like doing important business by phone? If it’s the latter, their only option is to provide you with their phone numbers, as it would be even ruder to demand yours. There are plenty of good reasons for people to have out-of-country email addresses, and suspecting a prospective renter of being up to no good because of his name is pretty far out there. If they’re trying to scam you, they’ll leave meatier hints along the way, especially if you take the common-sense precautions advised here–which you hopefully would have anyway.
I think you and **msmith537 ** are seeing this a little differently. You are assuming the cashier’s check was cashed. He seems to be assuming the check was deposited. Also, in this case an item isn’t being sold, it’s just advance payment of rent.
Considering the sums involved, it seems more likely that the check would get deposited, and the bank would discover in about a week that it really didn’t clear. Meanwhile, the victim *is * out the $2000 that was cashed out to the scammer. But the $8000 or whatever deposit is just an illusion, like it was all along.
Exactly. Either you cash the “check” and lose the whole amount plus fees, or you deposit the “check” and are out $2000. Lose/lose either way. The person who sent the “check” has no intention of going anywhere near the rental unit. BTW, don’t be fooled if you are given a local address to send the check to-it’ll be a drop that will disappear as soon as they get the money. Never do business with someone who doesn’t make a personal appearance, and even then it’s best if you accompany them to the bank so that they can withdraw the money personally and hand you cash.
Did you miss the part where the person who sends you the check asks you to send them a check for the excess payment, instead of using the excess as credit for future payments?