2 Female Friends Got Scammed On Craiglist For $2,200 Dollars

[NEMESIS_2008]

Your two friends are tards, sorry to say.
No tour of apartment?
Gave money and still did not get the keys?
Meet at coffee shop?

What's next? Send money through paypal because he is working in Nigeria?????

[WalterWhite]

lol your friends are morons

[iridium001]

Hm, troll thread me smells.

[charlotte1983]

How old are you two female friends? I seriously know no one that would give that amount of cash (or any cash for that matter) for something they haven't seen in person

[kiasu]

What? So you friends never see the place? I'm sorry to hear that but if you friends never see the place and pay them the deposit or whatever, sorry for my direct comment..you have the dumbiest friends in the world )

Warning.... renting scams going on in Craiglists. My friends just told me that they got scammed out of $2,200 about three weekends ago. There was a Craiglist ad about a downtown apartment for rent for $1,100 a month, a two bedroom at the corner of Charles st/Bay st. This was a sweet deal because apartments in the downtown core are double or triple that price. My friends e-mailed the guy and then called him, he told them the apartment was beautiful near Bay/Bloor and e-mailed them pictures of some apartment that had white carpet and even a mini-bar right in the middle of the livingroom. He told them to meet on a saturday at a coffee shop and that they would close the deal there. He told them to bring 1 month advance rent money with them and the current January rent in cash which is $2,200. At the coffee shop the guy seemed legit. He told them to bring documentation and a letter of recommendation from the last place they lived to "ensure I'm getting respectable tenants". He told them that smokers were not allowed into his unit. He asked for the money because he said he wanted them to get the apartment first and he would reserve it for them to make sure nobody else got it.

The guy had with him what looked like genuine documentation and a contract for the apartment. He made them sign like 4 different pages of the "contract". The girls gave him the money and he told them to meet him on Monday morning at the corner of Charles St/Bay St at the lobby of the building to show them the apartment and give them the keys to it so they could move-in immediately. Comes Monday morning the guy is nowhere to be seen and has not answered e-mail or his phone number since then. They went to the highrise at Charles st/Bay st and management told them they do not know anybody by the name of John Costanicci and here's the shocker, the "contract" they had with them with the building's name and address is fake and the management at the highrise told them it has nothing to do with them.

The culprit is a 55-something white guy, short, kinda chubby and bald. He claimed his name was John Costanicci. A search on Google for his name turns up nothing.

[ronin1701]

So without any proof your two female friends just gave the money...?

Which episode did that screen-shot come from?

[DealDemon]

Hm, troll thread me smells.

Agreed !

[Owbist]

Perhaps the "landlord" will contact them regarding payment of the February rent?

[HTTP04]

Which episode did that screen-shot come from?

Apparently from "A Matter of Perspective"

[Ottomaddox]

I wish i was ethically challenged enough to jump on this gravy train. The supply of marks seems endless.

[saugadealhunter]

Either OP is a troll or has a bunch of idiotic friends who fall the lamest scams.

[uber_shnitz]

Mistake 1:
Low market value should spring a red flag.

Mistake 2:
Why... would you even close a deal on an apartment without seeing the place in person first? Pictures can and usually are manipulated to make the place seem nicer than it is. I'd never EVER close a deal for a dwelling without visiting it first. We're not even talking about credentials of the guy here, you always want to see the goods/place first hand.

Mistake 3:
Paying cash. You should always choose a form of payment which can leave a trail in case something happens.

Yes it's a scam, but your friends aren't exactly very bright for falling for it...

[peanutz]

So...no one else is amused that the OP specified that they were female friends, for some reason...

[HTTP04]

So...no one else is amused that the OP specified that they were female friends, for some reason...

I wonder if they were blonde as well

[w4rrior]

Mistake 1:
Low market value should spring a red flag.

Mistake 2:
Why... would you even close a deal on an apartment without seeing the place in person first? Pictures can and usually are manipulated to make the place seem nicer than it is. I'd never EVER close a deal for a dwelling without visiting it first. We're not even talking about credentials of the guy here, you always want to see the goods/place first hand.

Mistake 3:
Paying cash. You should always choose a form of payment which can leave a trail in case something happens.

/thread

Gee, thanks for the warning OP!

It all does depend on how you look at it though, OP see's a scam, I see a $2200 lesson in how not to prospect for rental apartments.