Rental Scammer _ [email protected]

Michael Christopher Howard
<[email protected]>

Sorry
for the late reply. Thank you for taking the time to
look at my apartment. I'm the owner, my
name is Michael
Christopher Howard.
Now a few words about the place. The apartment
comes fully
furnished, is very clean,
quiet, and you can move in
immediately. It
has cable TV, high-speed internet,
dishwasher, washing machine and dryer. There are two
parking
spots and if you prefer to use your
own furniture there is a
storage unit where
you can deposit my furniture. Well
behaved
pets are allowed. The area is just great and a very
safe neighborhood.
The
monthly rent is $840 - utilities included (Cable,
water, sewer, electricity, heat) and please
note that the
rent is for the entire
apartment. I am looking for someone
to rent
anywhere from 1 month to 5 years or more. Most of
the time I'm offshore, I inspect oil rigs
for a living
and I'm looking for a
responsible person that can take a
very
good care of my apartment. I had some bad tenants and
now I had the property completely refurbished
(see attached
photos). As you can see I am
not after a high profit, but
after good
tenants who will treat my property as their own
home and I hope that you can send me some
personal
information about yourself.
The property is being managed by Airbnb and
they will
handle the whole rental process
since I work offshore for
the time
being.
If you want to know more about the
rental process please
get back to me and I
will send you the step by step
procedure.Find attached more photos and let me know
if you like the apartment.Regards,
Eng. Michael Christopher
Howard

Michael Christopher Howard <[email protected]> wrote:

As I already told you in my
first email, Airbnb will handle the renting process in my
behalf due to my offshore job. I will have to contact the
Airbnb agency and provide them all the necessary information
so they can start the rental process.For that I will
need your full name, rental period with exact move-in date,
if other persons will be living with you, your email, phone
number and a copy if your ID or Passport if
possible.
To secure the apartment
you will be instructed to pay just the security deposit of
$500 to Airbnb to confirm reservation ( which is fully
refundable in case you don't like the apartment
).Only once the deposit is paid an agent will be
assigned to handle the visit/ inspection so you will not be
able to visit the apartment before the
reservation.(Aibnb is a 20 billion dollars company
but it has to manage more than 1,500,000 locations, so they
would need an impossible number of agents to present every
location they have without a deposit confirmation)
Once you confirm the payment you'll have
two options, I could send you the keys by FedEx or you can
meet the agent that will hand over the keys and rental
agreement. Please note they require up to 48 hours to
process your payment and rental details before they assign
the agent that will handle the walk-through and all. The
$500 security deposit will be refunded immediately if you
don't like the place or once the contract will end if
you decide to rent. ( but only If the apartment is not
vandalized or something).
If you are
satisfied with the apartment all you have to do is to
provide a valid ID, pay the first month rent and sign the
lease agreement. After you move in, the monthly payment will
be sent directly to my bank account. If that is acceptable
please provide the requested details and I will submit your
application right away. I will send the Airbnb reservation
offer to your email and you can take it from there.
Very important !!
Please reply only if you fully understand the process as I
have been disappointed lately with unserious persons when it
comes to reserving. I'll have to pay for the transaction
fees and just in case you change your mind I will not
receive a refund from them!
You will find attached a photo of my passport
for more transparency.
Regards,
Eng. Michael Christopher
Howard

This Scammer will arrange to send you an Invoice -- Make no mistake, the Invoice will be fake !
If you are reading this because you have received such an invoice, kindly forward it to the address in my signature line and I will report the details to the appropriate authorities.

Hi, I sent him my license and passport in a black and white scanned image. What should I do to prevent anything from occurring?

The same thing just happened by [email protected] I'm infuriated

I almost fell for this too. But the longer I thought about it, it sounded too good to be true. And the fact that the listing was posted for $680/month, with everything you could ask for, but the"owner" had a note saying he's been disappointed with "unserious persons" not going through with reserving? For this good of a deal, why would anyone have trouble reserving? So I looked up Michael Christopher Howard and came across this site. I also know nothing about airbnb and its policies so I couldn't rely on my knowledge of that subject. Unfortunately my naive self gave him my name and phone number but that's about it. That info is probably online already anyway. I emailed this guy back asking why people had trouble reserving and he never replied back. Bingo.

Basically,

IF IT SOUNDS TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE -- IT PROBABLY IS.

Omg. Thank god I found your post. I have been talking to this guy for the past week about getting an apartment. Luckily I didn't send any info besides name and number! Please let me know where to send my screen shots.