Highlight the entire ad to see some really bizarre text.
I’ve seen this type of housing ad over and over again, and figured it may be some type of scam, but the ads are never flagged for removal as most scam ads on Craigslist are. They are in the houses for rent listings, and it seems to be more upscale housing that is going for much less than normal for that area.
What’s going on here? Is it a scam? I haven’t rented in years but I may be looking for a rental soon, and I need to be aware.
I called the number and got a recording saying “Thank you for calling Real Time Home Search,” and telling me my call was in a queue to be answered soon. I hung up and found that they are a business in Los Angeles; here is their BBB report.
The report says “This company’s business is an website offering access to foreclosured properties for a fee of $200.00.” The BBB gives this company a rating of F, meaning
However, they have logged no complaints against the company.
At the newspaper where I worked for many years, we had a constant stream of people trying to place these misleading ads. They would claim to have properties for sale or for rent, or repossessed cars for sale, but when readers called they would try to sell a list of properties that might be available if the sucker did his own leg work. We had strict policies against that, but as you see in the Craigslist ads, they are very hard to catch.
The ads are worded very specifically, with attractive come-ons. When the reader calls about the great house for sale at the great price, he gets a smooth operator who tells him “Oh, sorry, that house just sold! But I have some other fantastic deals – can I send you a list? I’ll just need your credit card number – we have to weed out those people who aren’t serious!” And unless they complain, the publication doesn’t know to pull the ad.
We let these people know verbally, by fax, in writing, in certified letter, that if they were going to run ads with us that they were going to state clearly in their ads that they were selling *only a list * and state the price of the list. They ignored us. As far as I know, the ads are running merrily on.
Thanks! I figured it was something like that; but why all the "hidden’ text? They don’t even hide it well. And the words are often nonsense words. They look Spanish, but I’ve only had 1 semster of Spanish, so I don’t know.
They post the nonsense text in the ads because CL doesn’t allow multiple postings in different areas. They post the same ad in different locations with a different block of bullshit text so the CL’s filters can’t tell that the ads are really identical.
Somewhat off-topic, but I’ve noted of late that when I post something on Craigslist, I almost immediately get an email expressing “interest” in the item. When I respond, I never get another reply, but do immediately start getting those stupid Pfizer and Lilly spam ads, which I still don’t understand the purpose of.
Thanks! That makes sense. I’ve also noticed they usually don’t specify an area. For example, certain houses for rent in Colorado are in the “Rocky Mountains” with no particular town listed. Good to know.
