craigslist apartment rental scams

In the past, some fraudulent Craigslist ads offered vehicles for sale, taking descriptions and photos from legitimate ads for used cars, Watanabe said. “They were selling the same car over and over, and people actually wired money,” she said.Just be careful about renting an apartment off Craigslist. Don't wire money without meeting the landlord or rental agent.
For Leslie Dean, a single parent looking for housing, the online ad offer seemed ideal: $800 in rent for a three-bedroom house in Kahana near shopping, restaurants, beaches and golf.

“I happened upon one of those too-good-to-be-true deals,” she said.

She soon learned it was exactly that.

Responding to the posting on the free advertising Web site Craigslist, she began corresponding by e-mail this month with “Bello A.” He claimed to be a “successful petroleum engineer” who had “urgently” moved his family to West Africa for his new business before he could make arrangements to rent the three-year-old house. Explaining the low price, he said he was more interested in finding someone “who can promise us good maintenance and take the house like his or her own.”

After soliciting personal information, including her name, age, occupation, address and telephone number, “Bello A.” said he would “ship” the house keys to Dean once she wired an $800 “commitment fee” to him in Nigeria.

“There were the red flags,” said Dean, a West Maui resident who never sent the money but continued the correspondence for a few days to see what would happen. “I’m just one person, but I wonder how many people might have sent the money.”

At least one person from Oregon was duped by the scam while using the Craigslist Web site to try to find a rental on Maui, said Terry Tolman of the Realtors Association of Maui.

He said the scam has surfaced in recent weeks, with Craigslist ads offering rental homes in various Maui locations for as little as $800 a month. The rent usually includes “hydro, heat, laundry facilities, air condition and so on.”

The ads give addresses of actual homes that are for sale, with accompanying information and photos taken from online sales listings.



The online Web site allows anyone with an e-mail address to post free classified advertising listings in various categories, including jobs, housing and items for sale or trade. The listings are grouped by location.


“As soon as I mentioned the word ‘scam,’ they completely shut down,” the man said.

That offer was followed by a second similar offer from another “buyer,” which the man also ignored.

“People who lose money always wire money,” Watanabe said. “It’s an immediate transfer of funds and you don’t know who it’s going to, especially if it’s going out of the country.”

She noted that craigslist doesn’t collect information on buyers and sellers, unlike some other Internet sales sites such as eBay, which has cooperated with government subpoenas in fraud investigations.

In fact, the craigslist Web site includes the disclaimer: “Craigslist is not involved in any transaction, and does not handle payments, guarantee transactions, provide escrow services, or offer ‘buyer protection’ or ‘seller certification.’ “

Among tips posted on Craigslist for avoiding scams and fraud is the recommendation that buyers “deal locally with folks you can meet in person” to avoid “99 percent of the scam attempts on craigslist.”

Another craigslist suggestion: “Never wire funds via Western Union, money gram or any other wire service — anyone who asks you to do so is a scammer.”

In the case of the fraudulent Maui home rental ads, Tolman said there’s no way of knowing where or who the scammer is.

“He could be sitting in New York City or on Molokai,” Tolman said. “It’s spooky how much information people will give away through e-mail to somebody they don’t even know.”

While the fraudulent ads haven’t affected the actual homeowners or Realtors, “it’s a distraction,” Tolman said. “What you would hate to have happen is for the agent to be showing the house and somebody trying to move in.”

He said anyone who lives on Maui would realize the rental offer is too good to be true. Anyone who drove by the advertised houses could see they were for sale, Tolman said.

That was the case for Dean, who contacted a Realtor and learned the Kahana house was in escrow — and not for rent.