Room for Rent and other rental scams
#233177 by Jesse14 Tue Jan 06, 2015 2:54 am
Hello all! I was recently approached from a Craigslist ad with a scammer. I referenced that I lived near San Diego State University in the ad and was looking for two roomates. She went by the name Amy Strine. Things seemed normal enough and she was quick to accept the room. She told me she was in Guam on research and would be arriving the 3rd so things needed to get done fast. Once I had accepted her as a new roommate she said her dad would be sending me a check with the first months rent (which is $650). I received a check a few days for $2350.32. She knew I received it from a tracking number and told me my next move would be to wire $1650 to her car person: Chu liang.. Address... 93-25 Rockaway Boulevard, Ozone Park, NY 11417. Being a young girl my mother told me this was absolutely not okay and sounded like a scam. I told her I would let her know when the check cleared. She continued to pester me that the check should have cleared and things should be moving along. I even went to the bank and told them I was worried about it and they said it cleared -_- I knew things were off because she was texting me at hours that did not fit for her to be in Guam so I began to get very suspicious. I told her she needed to add me on Facebook, which she did very reluctantly facebook.com/amy.strine1. I asked her to send me a selfie, she send a random photo that was not a selfie. I noticed abnormalities and lies on her Facebook. At this point I was openly saying "I think this is fake" and she was very reassuring that it wasn't! I got to the point where I told her she couldn't move in and I wouldn't send any money before I met her in person. She did not like this and started to demand I wire her her money back. I asked where to: Ajit Kumar.. Address: 2227 Bellanca Street, Minden, NV 89423, she claimed this was her fiancee. I told her I would get back to her monday. In the course of the weekend I learned how to reverse google image search and found some of the photos on this sight.

Hope this helps someone!

Amy's phone numbers:
7026631964
6468015145

Reverse google image search: https://images.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl
click the camera button and follow directions.


Here is the original email:

Thanks so much for your quick response, I'm interested in renting the room. My name is Amy Strine i was born in France (Paris) i speak both French & English, am single, fun,loving,clean, loyal and respectful of others, don't have any pet. More about me, my father is from US and my mother is from France. I'm 26yrs old, sex female, i attend American University of Paris, graduated a year ago.

I will be arriving to state by January 3rd, am coming for my master's degree .I'm coming to stay for a year, I'm currently in Guam (Sinajana)" on a research work and will be coming soon...i'll loved to call you but here is a remote area calls are very hard to go through, please

send me some picture of the room if you can because i will not be able to come over and check on it before renting.

Please tell me little about yourself...if you are a student?,working?, married or single?, if there is a garage or parking space because i will be coming with my own car. Let me know the total amount for the first month rent, i will be paying upfront so that you can be rest assured that am really interested in renting the room from you...

I will be paying via a Bank certified check, so please get back to me with the following details so that i can ensure you are ready to rent the room to me. I will sign all necessary papers/Lease at the point of my arrival because there is no printer and scanner close to me.

BELOW IS THE INFORMATION NEEDED

***Full Name:
***Street Address,City,State,Zip Code:
***Cell & Home #:
***Total amount for move in:

I'll be waiting to read back from you with the information requested so that i can forward it to my father to issue out the check for the deposit and month rent upfront as soon as possible, with that you can hold on the place prior my arrival.Thanks for your co-operation.
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#233839 by lxiong27 Sun Jan 11, 2015 10:35 am
I received the same exact email!!

Fortunately my apartment does not sublet, but re-leases, so I am not accountable for any exchange in money and I realized things were off early because she was dancing around the subject of applying for a lease and passing a background check. Not only that, but she said she's 26 and in Guam for research, but her picture on Google plus says it was added in 2005, so she would have been 16 when it was taken! And she randomly sent me the same picture as her Google+ profile picture. My boyfriend agreed that everything was fishy, so we google searched her picture and, there it was on THIS scam website !! viewtopic.php?f=13&t=3713

And randomly under sports profiles.
http:/ /www. footballtop .com/ user/13758

This was a GREAT waste of a time, because I put a lot of thought and time into my emails, but at least I still have those for reference for the future. I'm so grateful I inevitably found this page, because the scammer is STILL using the same email, email account, name, picture, phone number and is still contacting people through craigslist.

So after reading this forum, I decided to end my conversations with this scammer like this:

"Sorry, Godzilla destroyed my building, so I can no longer sublease it.

Goodbye!"
#378040 by aw8761 Sun Dec 09, 2018 10:49 am
It's 2018 and the same thing is still happening! I listed a room for rent in VA and the "person" who was interested goes by Regina Duke. The name might change after this. She reached out to me through text and I thought it was real because this isn't the first time a person (albeit, real) has texted me through Craigslist. Everything else is still relatively the same, with a few details changed: 25 yo female student born in France who speaks both French & English (single, fun, loving, clean, loyal and respectful of others, don't have any pet); father is from US and mother is from France; graduated from Oxford University last year and is currently in Sinajana, Guam doing research; will be coming soon (no exact date) and is coming to the local college for a year for her master's; needs a car space/garage since she's bringing her car; wants pictures of the room since she won't be able to see the room before she moves in.

I was first unsettled by her wanting to come and rent the place before even seeing where it was and what everything looked like. Eventually, I asked for a picture and I reverse image searched it immediately - came up with nothing. I mean no offense to the lady in the picture that I got, but she did not look 25; she looked like she was in her mid-30s at least. The next red flag was that her dad was going to mail me a check; I had a friend who also had a similar scam happen to her, so that made me super-hesitant. Another red flag was that she is "not really into social media thing" (verbatim) which I understand, but you should have at least a facebook from when everyone had an FB or a picture that adds up and there was nothing. I looked absolutely everywhere for this person and couldn't find a single piece of info that matched up with what she sent me.

I am also lucky that my apartment only re-leases and I am currently trying to get her to fill out an application and she's fighting me tooth and nail. She wants me to help her fill out the application, but it's all personal information that another person really shouldn't have access to, so that was fishy as well. I also asked her what she studied at Oxford and nothing on that. I am SO SO glad I found this website because I genuinely thought I was being a jerk for not letting this girl rent the room right off the bat, but here I am saving myself from a possible scam.

The number this person uses is (626)-600-2395; it's for a phone number in La Puente, CA, which is in LA county.

I know this is a lot of information, but if I can help someone else avoid this, I'll give as much info as I can! Best of luck out there!

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