Rental Scammer - [email protected]

From: Stacy <[email protected]>
Date: Sat, May 12, 2012 at 11:11
Subject: RE: $2565 / 3br - LakeFront Townhome, fully remodeled (redwood city)
To: Con Warner


Hello,
I apologize for not responding to you earlier, I have been extremely busy the last few days!

The good news is that the rental is still available! We had a tentative agreement from the first person we showed it to, but now it seems that they changed their mind, so we need to lease it as soon as possible. You were the second one to email me about it, so its only fair to give you the first shot.

We know you will want to do a walk through of the property, but my husband doesn't want me to advertise the address as a measure of safety. Last time we did that without verifying people, the empty property was broken into and vandalized. We don't want that to happen again! You will be responsible for cable, internet, and phone, if you decide to have these services. Just to confirm, we DO allow pets at this property.

The rental term is 12-month lease, but can be switched into a 6-month lease if preferred. We just ask that you give us fair notice if you are moving out.

If you would like to set up an appointment, go to the link below and request the free copy of your rental report. We use this site for all the properties we manage. Just fill out the form and indicate that you want the free report. The actual scores aren't important to us, it's more of a formality to have it on file, to make sure there are no previous proerty related issues.

Get your report here: FULL REPORT

Remember, we only need to see the page about the rental history. That will be all you will need to bring with you to the showing.

As far as getting together to see the property goes, I am available to show it any time from 10:00 am on, for the next few days. Let me know once you have it printed out, and we will set up a time to do your walk-through.

Thank you once again for your interest!

Stacy

The link that you are asked to click is possibly a phishing site in which your personal details are harvested for identity theft.
Sometimes these links go to an actual credit report company that pays the scammer a small amount for your custom.
After visiting the site and replying to this person, the scam begins.

This person then asks for proof that you are able to pay the deposit and rent due to a string of time wasters.
This proof is in the form of a Western Union or MoneyGram payment either to him, your friend or a family member.

Sounds safe. It's not!

At other times, this person asks for a deposit payment via Western Union or Moneygram with the promise that they will send the keys through a courier company.

In either case, if payment is made and you give this person the details, they will collect the money.
You will not hear from them again.

If you are reading this because you are looking for property to rent, and you are in contact with this thief you are probably searching Craigslist, Gumtree or similar listing sites. If you receive any requests from 'Landlords' asking for some kind of payment before viewing, then it will also be a scam. Please forward the mail to me at the address in my signature line and I will investigate and list them if necessary.

I just recently got that one...I knew something was off when I kept getting the same response back then they sent me the last one with they already rented the space to someone already...I'm glad I caught your post on craigslist about it and about this site. It's very helpful. All those scam posts are making it hard for me to find a place online. I'm better off taking a day off and be at loss of a days income than a lifetime of regret and loss...I'll be checking in on this site often. This is Great site to turn to.

This one got me! I entered all my information and got the credit report. It seemed legit.
Do you have advice for me on what I should do now?! I'm scared!

THANK YOU SO MUCH!

Hello renter and welcome to Scamwarners.
If you entered your credit card information to get your credit report you signed up for a "service" with a monthly reoccurring charge. If you read the fine print on the the web pages you will see the service mentioned.

Call and cancel your subscription now before they post a charge to your account.

I've also clicked the link but didn't give enough information to get my credit report.

However, this "person" has multiple posts on craigslist! They also go by many emails! Make sure that you hover over hyperlinks to see the address they go to. I am very aware of all these types of scams but sometimes you just are so anxious to do something you forget.

The FULL REPORT link that "SAlly" provides links to http://crdetchkks.co.cc/6cPR44nBp2MgCxOWlwHbag which is in NO WAY a real credit report site. Something tells me that if you provided your information to this site it goes so some sort of credit report company since I noticed it will redirect you to the last credit report site that you looked up.

"Stacy Low" has 2 emails, potentially a different email for every post "she" makes on craigslist and all the 1sr reply emails are the same.

The 2 emails I've received from "her" are [email protected] and [email protected]

I wish there was better security on Craigslist so that we would have to take such precautions.

I just forwarded you the email. I'm sort of scared right now. I clicked the link and gave my information to get a credit score. But I cancelled it that same day. I'm scared the person who sent the email will also get my social security number and information from that sight. Will they??? I don't want to they to have taken my identity, will they??? Please let me know if I have to report it. I just finished paying off being scammed once. I don't need my credit to be bad again!!

In most cases that we have seen of this scenario, the scammer is redirecting the victim to a credit reporting site that sells "memberships" for credit monitoring. These sites offer a "free" report, but requesting that report automatically signs you up for an annual membership. The scammers receive a referral fee for each person who is signed up for a membership through their link. The scammers merely use the fake rental or job ad as a lure to get a large number of people to sign up so they can collect the fee.

If you gave the credit report site a credit card number, then you have been signed up for a membership, and they will start charging fees to your credit card. Generally people who have been signed up in these scams have reported that canceling the membership has been difficult, and many report that charges have appeared on their card even though they told the site to cancel. Often the sites set up cancellation policies that have very specific requirements, and if the member does not follow those specific requirements, they keep charging them based on the failure to follow the procedure.

If you have given a credit card number, it is best to make sure you review the site's cancellation policy to make sure that you have followed it. Make sure you receive confirmation of the cancellation from the site, and if they don't give it to you, DEMAND it in writing. Keep that confirmation so that you can use it if it is necessary to dispute any credit card charges.

There have been a few recent reports of a variant in which the victims were not redirected to a major credit reporting site, but that the information was collected by the scammers themselves. While these reports are unverified, in this situation identity theft would be a concern. If there is any reason to believe this is the case here, you might want to consider opening a fraud alert with the credit bureaus. More information on placing a fraud alert can be found here: http://www.fightidentitytheft.com/flag.html

Response same as above from [email protected]
to this craigslist ad

http://sfbay.craigslist.org/eby/apa/3194633923.html

thanks for sharing!

I was just scammed by staeylow as well. This is the third scam that I have run into while looking for a rental property but the 1st one that I actually fell for. I clicked on the link and went through the credit report process. It was not until I went back to the link and noticed that it was now redirected me to the home page of Google instead of the credit reporting site.

I called my credit card company and have cancelled the card. Listed below is the link along with the description - stay away from this property or Stacey Low:

$2610 / 4br - Lovely 4 Bed/ 2 Bath Home (walnut creek)

http://sfbay.craigslist.org/eby/apa/3272797060.html

It is so disappointing that there are people in the world like this . . .

Shari

Feel like a fool, fell for it. Wondering what kind of damage it will do on my end. I wish I had seen this site sooner.

As I check ALL links before clicking, and noticed this seemed like a super shady e-mail, I thought I'd double check. Sure enough!

Check it:

Stacy [email protected]
7:49 AM (1 hour ago)

to me
Hello,
I apologize for not responding to you earlier, I have been extremely busy the last few days!

The good news is that the rental is still available! We had a tentative agreement from the first person we showed it to, but now it seems that they changed their mind, so we need to lease it as soon as possible. You were the second one to email me about it, so its only fair to give you the first shot.

We know you will want to do a walk through of the property, but my husband doesn't want me to advertise the address as a measure of safety. Last time we did that without verifying people, the empty property was broken into and vandalized. We don't want that to happen again! You will be responsible for cable, internet, and phone, if you decide to have these services. Just to confirm, we DO allow pets at this property.

The rental term is 12-month lease, but can be switched into a 6-month lease if preferred. We just ask that you give us fair notice if you are moving out.

If you would like to set up an appointment, go to the link below and request the free copy of your rental report. We use this site for all the properties we manage. Just fill out the form and indicate that you want the free report. The actual scores aren't important to us, it's more of a formality to have it on file, to make sure there are no previous proerty related issues.

Get your report here: FULL REPORT (link goes to: http://creditcheckss.co.cc/6cPP44nrR2MgkK0WlWCbag <-- do NOT click this)

Remember, we only need to see the page about the rental history. That will be all you will need to bring with you to the showing.

As far as getting together to see the property goes, I am available to show it any time from 10:00 am on, for the next few days. Let me know once you have it printed out, and we will set up a time to do your walk-through.

Thank you once again for your interest!

Stacy

Thank you so much for setting up this website and for all of you who have replied.

I looked up the email [email protected] and found this site, and got your warnings.

The scam posting I found was on Craigslist, with the title "Spacious 4br/2.5bath Home for Rent" in Milpitas.

I just got the very same email back from Stacey low, who managed to spell her own name wrong in signing off on the email. I thought that was a little weird, I had followed the link to an equifax website, but didn't fill in anything, so I should be ok, hopefully. Thanks to everyone who posted about this. I scanned my computer with security essentials and I'll do it again with malwarbytes to make sure I didn't pick up anything and I'll report back if I get any negative results. But, I'm pretty sure its as other posters have guessed and this person is just trying to get the fee, as the actual site seemed legit and was one of those credit reports that charges monthly.

Glad I saw this post. I got the same email this morning with a link to Equifax. I didn't fill out my information at that time because I was not sure about it. I clicked on the link again after a few hours and it redirected me to Google.com. At that point I thought something was fishy and did a search for the email id and found this post.

This is the Craigslist post that I had responded to: http://sfbay.craigslist.org/eby/apa/3459587384.html

I totally got scammed by Stacy today in the SF Bay area. I knew the place seemed to be too good to be true. But I was almost tricked b/c the website link went to what looked like Equifax!

In addition to the whole email you all posted I also had this at the bottom...

he user. Provided you keep this cardinal rule in mind, you
"... the cost of adding a feature isn't just the time it takes
it lacks in style." -- Tom Stoppard
(without necessarily achieving it) than for any other single
as my telephone. My wish has come true. I no longer know how
organizations. (For example, if you have four groups working on

Is there any way to report these people?