With so many homes being foreclosed on in the Big Bear Valley, former owners are
now looking for rental property to move in to. There is little doubt in my mind that the former
owner is going through a very stressful time as the deal with the foreclosure and they may be letting their guard down
when looking for a home to move in to. In a lot of cases, the former owner needs to be out of the property within
30 days after being contacted by the bank that the property wass taken back. In a rush to find a new home, they may
not be thinking clearly. No matter how stressed you feel over the current situation, DO NOT,
I repeat, DO NOT let your guard down. While there are many honest home owners out there
who are willing to rent to someone with not so perfect credit, there are a number of different scams being put into play.
Below, I am going to describe just a few of them that I have encountered as I too look for a home to rent. In
fact, sSince writing this blog, one of the REO properties that I had listed for sale was scammed with scam #1.
SCAM
#1
In two
separate occasions I found a home on Craigslist that looked nice, was in a decent neighborhood, and was being offered at a
great price. In both of these occasions, I emailed the individual and asked for more information on the
property. The next day I received a rather long email from who I thought was the owner of the property.
He informed me that he was in South Africa doing volunteer missionary work and would not be back in the states for
a few years and wanted to rent out the house. As soon as I read South Africa, the red
flag started to wave. He asked a number of questions which looked to me like the normal type of questions
being asked by a landlord and as none of the questions had to do with bank account numbers; I answered them and sent the email
back to him. When I was out at the house, I did notice that it was for sale as a short sale and emailed
him back asking about this. In the meantime, I did some research and found out that he owned $260,000 on
the property and it was being offered as a short sale for $130,000. This is when it really gets crazy.
His email response was that the home had been on the market in the past but did not sell as Realtors over inflate the
prices in order to get higher commissions. He also told me that he would send me the documentation that
I needed to fill out and once he received my check for the $800.00 plus $650.00 deposit, the bank would authorize him to send
me the keys. At that point I asked him if I could get the keys from the Realtor who has it listed
and again, he claims that the home was not supposed to be listed.
At this point I am very suspect of this entire situation.
To start with, the bank isn’t going to care who he rents the property to and they sure as heck do not have the
keys. The next thing that concerned me was the asking price for the rent was $300.00 below similar properties.
On top of that, they offered rental price was to include all utilities. My father always told me
that if something sounds too good to be true, then it probably was.
The emails were coming from a yahoo email with the current owners name on them but something
was just not right. If an owner is in trouble on his house and chooses to rent it out until the bank forecloses,
then he has that right. But what happened in both of the cases that I was involved with, I was NOT dealing
with the owner. I contacted the local title company and they provided me with a property profile on the
property at no cost. I then did some research and found a contact phone number for the real owner of the
property. When I started telling him what was going on, he was speechless as he was not trying to rent
out his home. I gave him all of the information that I had, including all emails, but there wasn’t
much he could do other than keep an eye on his home.
Home ownership information is a matter of public record and it is very easy to find out
who you are. In this scam, they were finding out the names of the home owner, setting up an email account
representing themselves as the owner, and then placing ads in places like Craig’s List marketing the property for
rent. I can guarantee you that once that money was sent out, it was gone and you would not be seeing any
keys.
In the most recent case, I had an REO property listed for sale in Big Bear City. About a week after
the listing was posted, I started getting phone calls from people asking me if the property was for rent, sale, lease, or
what! I explained that the property was an REO and that it was for sale. That was when I learned that these people
had found the property online for rent. I googled the property address and sure enough, there was a nice flyer all made
up with the pictures that I had taken, stating that the place was in fact for rent. The people that they spoke to claimed
that they were in Texas doing missionary work and were looking for someone to take the property on a long term lease.
If you go to look at a house for rent that you find on the internet and you see a for sale sign on the property,
call the agent and ask if the property is for rent. DO NOT send any money unless you are 100% sure
that the property is for rent and you are dealing with the owner or his licensed Real Esate Agent.
SCAM #2
I was rather taken back by this scam. The bank
assigned me a property and when I went to check it out, the former owner was still living there with her family.
Sadly, the lady was visually impaired and needed help to get through the day. We worked out relocation assistance to
help her move and I told her that I would be back as soon as the bank sent me the paperwork. The day that
I went to get signatures for the relocation agreement, she was just signing the paperwork for the lease on the rental that
she was moving in to. What went on between her and the Realtor was none of my business so I didn’t
say anything. But I did think it strange that this guy wanted the $1000.00 deposit in cash.
As the lady did not have the money until her check came on the 1st, he took a check but told her that he would be back
on the 1st to get the cash. As soon as he left, we finished up with the paperwork that I needed
and left. I didn’t see her again until the day that she was to be out of the house. When
I got there, I could see that she was distraught and had been crying. I asked if everything was ok and
it was then that she told me that someone else was living in the house that she thought she was renting and the person that
she had been dealing with was long gone! From what the Police told me, this guy was renting a house out
that he had no business renting. He would convince his victim that they were finishing up the repairs and
that they could move in to the property in 10 days. He would get minimum cash deposit of $1000.00 and you
never heard from him again. I’m told that he would rent the same property out to as many as 10 people!
If you ever have a question on who owns
a home, you can call any title company and ask their customer service dept. to send you a property profile. Most will
be happy to send it to you at zero cost. Once you have the profile, you can see who owns the house, how long they have
owned it, and it will even go so far as to tell you how much he paid for the property.
I know this has been a long blog but I feel very strong
about getting this information out. If you find that you need to rent a home, be very careful.
Remember what my father instilled into me. If it sounds too good to be true, it normally isn’t
Tony Card
tony@tonycard.com