Hi Annette Lawrence , Palm Harbor, FL 727-420-4041  

 I wrote a blog post several years ago about a lady calling on my listing.  She was going to wire somebody a lot of money for rent (Craigslist); she had the wisdom to drive by it first. 

     When she saw my for sale sign, she knew something was wrong and called me.  I drove over there and put a sign in the window, "Beware of Craigslist Scam - this is NOT FOR RENT"  

Yes.  We closed escrow on a place a couple weeks back and found it on zillow shortly thereafter.  Reported it and zillow was VERY quick to remove it.  Within minutes versus the days of craigslist where it could take weeks.  We printed the signs from our DA's office and posted them as well.  Luckily, we found it 15 minutes after it was listed, so no issues.

Fantastic idea to place a sign and prevent a financial crisis for potential renters out there Annette!

WOW! Great idea! Been there, LONG ago a 'for sale listing' of mine, a lady showed up at my office with a rental agreement signed by 'property manager John' wanting keys! She had put up a deposit! I'm like my seller is NOT renting the property, let's turn in John! Filed police report, I don't know if she got her deposit back but I rather doubt it . . . 

Interesting, thanks for sharing. 

I wonder if creating a Google alert for the property address would alert the agent if someone is trying to rent the place.

This has been going on for many years.  I first encountered it on a listing that a scammer from craigs list tried renting it out.   He told the victims he lived in FL and they'd have to wire them the deposit. HA.  Thank goodness the poor lady called me from the sign and wondered if she could see it first, before she wired the funds.  HUH? Well that got shut down fast once I found out about it - which was the first day and I'm glad I could help that lady save her money from that low life.

We cannot be too careful these days ... the scammers will never stop and people will continue to get scammed and lose money. 

Had this happen to one of my listings last year. The prospective tenant had been in email contact with the "owner" and was instructed not to call the agent on the sign. Luckily, the guy was smart enough to call me anyway especially after seeing my notices in the windows similar to yours. 

The scammers seam to be alive and well in every nook and cranny of the universe. 😠

You can't be to careful theses days. Guess you have to go the extra mile with disclosure signage.

It happens quite often, we post those signs in the window too with the phone number of our rental manager.

My broker also places those signs in/on properties and while it has happened,  it's been years for us.  In fact I think the last one was my daughter's house which was owner occupied and despite the sign they knocked on the door and asked.

What nonsense

It is rare that they get past my junk mail Annette Lawrence , Palm Harbor, FL 727-420-4041 and I no long second guess my junk filter. For about two years now I delete it every day without taking a peak at it.

All of us need to be alert for the endless number of scammers.

Yep, there is alot of this in my area also. People just don't read or they just can't imagine why someone would want to sell this house rather then rent to them.

Guess I have been lucky, no scammers have stolen my listing for a lease in years.

I haven't seen this scam in about 3-4 years or so. On the buyer side, I got a lead a couple of weeks back that I am almost certainly sure was a scammer. The buyer is claiming that a high profile developer discriminated against him...yet he is supposedly in contract. There is the potential for buyer misunderstanding as the project hasn't yet sold enough to be declared effective- so the buyer can't close until the project is at least 15% sold and the building has at least a partial Certificate of Occupancy. The Penthouse unit that the buyer is claiming to be in contract for- hasn't been priced or approved by the NY Attorney General's office- so it's impossible to be in contract in that case. While the buyer didn't state any numbers- I know that the developer is targeting somewhere around $39-40 million for the Penthouse apartment but they haven't finalized pricing that unit. It's just all weird because the buyer knows enough for me to know that he did some homework...but the details don't make sense. 

Last year I had a buyer try to scam by providing fake bank statements showing $100 million balance. There were details that just didn't make sense- i.e. the statement date ending but the transfer in date was for the week after the statement dated had ended. It didn't take me more than a few seconds to determine the statement was fake. 

Oh Florida. Yes, yes and double yes. It's like a breeding ground for these clowns. I'm just so tired and hardened by all the BS they inflict on our industry. So disgusted I decided to pursue getting licensed in the mid west in hopes of nicer, less scammy transactions.

Annette Lawrence , Palm Harbor, FL 727-420-4041 Unfortunately, this scam has been around for years. I have blogged about the subject and talked about it on my radio show.

One family took the scam bait on Christmas week. They filled out long, complicated forms and gave all their personal information plus a deposit. They even got a "key," but there was no access when they arrived at the house with children, a moving truck, and the excitement of a new home.

The  ''blank key'' was not a fit!! No recourse. And did I mention it was Christmas week?

Yes, they're everywhere, and usually easy to spot.