Even long term renters have to be aware that the landlord who rents you a place may not actually be the landlord. With the amount of vacant and foreclosed homes in todays market, at least one scumbag tried taking advantage of it by posting as a landlord and renting out units to unsuspected renters.

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) - After KRQE News 13 reported on a phony landlord renting foreclosed homes as his own property more people are coming forward claiming they’ve been scammed.

At least six people now have told News 13 that Ernest Garcia, who also is known as Ricardo Lombardy, offered to rent homes to them.

Three women interviewed for Thursday’s report said Garcia took deposits and rent for homes that were vacant from foreclosures. Two of the women said Garcia took money from them separately for the same house.

The third renter described a real estate agent telling her to get out of her home after she’d paid Garcia $1,000.

The renters said Garcia would go to the back of the house and let them in the front door after apparently breaking in through the back.

They say once he collected the money for a deposit or rent, he then gave them the slip.

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 6th, 2009 at 11:38 amand is filed under Scams. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.