Two Primary Vacation Rental Scams
January 19th, 2008
There are essentially 2 main vacation rental scams. Be aware of them and do whatever you need to do to protect yourself from them.
1) A fake “renter” contacts a real owner and requests to rent the property. The fake renter then sends a check to the owner as a security deposit to rent the property. But they write a check that exceeds the proper amount of security deposit. The fake renter then waits a few days until the owner cashes the check, then contacts the owner and says they overpaid, and pleads for a refund in the amount overpaid… usually by telling the owner to send the refund of the amount overpaid via Western Union, and usually to Nigeria or Central Africa. A few days later, the check that the fake renter from Nigeria gave you will bounce… and so you are out that money, and you are also out of the money you just sent them via Western Union.
HERE is more information on this scam.
2) A fake “owner” will post their rental property on a rental property directory website such as www.free-rentals.com. However, the rental listing is a fake. Usually fake address, fake pictures, fake place. But the email and phone number will be real, so they get contacted. The rental seeking victim then contacts the fake owner and requests to book the place. Of course it’s available. The owner then requests a security depost and sends the contract. The renter sends a security deposit, then shows up but there’s no such place available for rent.
For this second type of scam, USUALLY the biggest barrier for the scammer is that they have to PAY to join a vacation rental directory website… Most sites are about $150 USD per year, usually too steep of a price for these such scammers. However, since Free-Rentals.com is free, it leaves us wide open for these kind of scammers to sign up and try to scam someone. So please be on the lookout and very careful of this type of scam when seeking a rental.
We do everything in our power to find and weed out such scammers, but we need your help. If you suspect any of these 2 scams on free-rentals.com, please contact the free-rentals.com staff immediately.