Investor · hampton, VA · Member since 2009 · 428 posts · 249 votes
So I had one of my rentals on craigslist with a lockbox on the front door. I've been using lock boxes for 10 years. I had a rental on the market for a few weeks giving out the code to people to look inside. Yesterday I went to the house and there were clothes and boxes inside the house. A few hours later 2 people showed up with a uhaul truck full ready to move in. Could have been a disaster. They said they wired $1400 to a man in ohio and they had a fake lease on MY HOUSE. anybody else got a craigslist nightmare...
i assume u gave the guy in Ohio the code too.. Go through your call records and see if the Ohio area code is there. If he used google voice with a local number... He is smart.
First of all, tsk tsk to everyone who suggests Kris should not allow people to visit his rentals unattended.
Real estate is all about risk management - taking the right risks and not assuming the wrong risks. It's not about avoiding risk entirely. In many areas, allowing people unescorted access to a house works most of the time, in other areas it is stupid. But escorting in areas with a low probability of trouble is a waste of time. How do you know what the situation is?
I would point out that Kris was vigilant in monitoring his property and caught this situation and was not hurt. I would say he gets an A+ for risk management and risk mitigation and will probably, therefore, do very well with his business.
As far as lockboxes go, I'm leaning towards figuring out how to make these remote controlled lock systems go. This way you can change the lock for every visitor.
http://www.wired.com/2013/06/smart-locks/
You can buy one or two and then move it from house to house.
>KNC<
thnx for those positive words katharine. Yes, I go by my rentals frequently because we all know people viewing can be dirty and leave lights on and turn ac down very low etc, etc. But in 10 years of putting lockboxes on houses, I dont mind this 1 thing.... I will change the codes more frequently. The scammer is in ohio, never gave him the code. Not sure whether he called from another fon # to get the code.
I've had several of my ads stolen on craigslist and re-written with lower rents. Craigslist will pull them if notified but they often pop up again like mushrooms after a spring rain. Same scenario as others have mentioned; someone reports they're doing "god's work" (here in the south folks often don't question those who claim to be doing such work) and are renting their homes on the cheap.
Last one that came up on craigslist I got so mad at I actually called the number and left a message that if I ever found them I'd hunt them down and blow them to kingdom come (I thought that was rather ironic...must have been a Monday when I called). Must of scared that scammer; another ad for the house never showed up again.
We were once working on the roof of one of our vacant houses and I'd left the front door open. Two different groups of folks drove up, got out and before I could get off the roof had gone inside and were wandering around, just in love with the place for the "advertised' rent. Broke their little hearts when I told them they weren't getting a four bedroom, two bath house with new appliances and finished hardwood floors for $500 a month.
I regularly get calls from people who see my spoofed listings. Once they drive by the home and see my real estate sign out front, they usually put two and two together and alert me that they think there is a fake listing
As far as putting a lockbox on a house and allowing unsupervised showings...not a chance in hell. The showing is the first step in the tenant screening process.
Changing lock box codes still doesn't solve the potential for someone to take the key from the lock box to the local hardware store and make a copy for future use. I work in very safe neighborhoods and STILL never have I let anyone into my property unescorted. Even realtors don't do that sort of thing.
I found a Craigslist scam that may be related. Tonight I posted a rental to CL, and almost immediately the advertisement was duplicated several times, with a lower price, and a Google Voice number [REMOVED] with a request to text them. It was so quick that they must be using an automated program.
I'm sure they ask the victim to wire money to them for the rent/deposit. Hopefully a moving truck doesn't show up in front of my house.
I let people call me from the house and give them the code when they get there. Usually selling, though, not renting. The time saved is worth something bad happening once in a while. I've done plenty that way and have never had any trouble. Guess a lot of that would depend on the areas you're working in.
The new smart locks coming out are pretty cool, you can send a code to their iPhone that'll let them in for an hour or so. Pretty expensive still, but that technology is on its way. Not sure that'd work in the low end stuff, though.
One thing that I dtarted doing to deter scammers is add my company name and phone number to every picture. It only takes seconds and is free at Add Text. If scammers do copy your add, your phone number is still on each picture.
I had a problem with my houses being advertised at low prices by Nigerian scammers. Since adding my info to each pic, that has all stopped. They will move on to lower hanging fruit.
I have run into this type of scam on Craigslist as well. We will post a property for rent and then someone will take our listing and create one with a lower price. When the scammer is contacted by a potential renter they tell them to drive by the house and look in the windows since they are not available to show it. Then they ask for the person to wire them the deposit if they want to move in.
In one case I was wrapping up a showing when a family showed up to look at the property. After I showed it to them I went over the details (rent amount, deposit, etc) and they thought I was trying to rip them off since the rent price was so much higher. I asked them who they talked to and where they got the price. They showed me the ad on Craigslist and also gave me the phone number of the person from the listing. So I called the person and inquired how they were able to rent the property since they were not the owner and were not the property manager. Obviously the call did not last more then a minute since they hung up on me.
Good thing I was able to save this family money since they had not wired the money yet but were going to wire it that day.
One thing that I dtarted doing to deter scammers is add my company name and phone number to every picture. It only takes seconds and is free at Add Text. If scammers do copy your add, your phone number is still on each picture.
I had a problem with my houses being advertised at low prices by Nigerian scammers. Since adding my info to each pic, that has all stopped. They will move on to lower hanging fruit.
That's a good idea. I have a program that will batch add a watermark to photos.
Today I noticed a family walking though the backyard of my rental. She and her kids drove all the way across town, and were so excited to finally find a nice home at a great price in this tight market. I hated to tell her that it was a scam. She was crushed. But fortunately I was there to warn her not to send anyone money. I now have a warning sign on the front door.
Today I noticed a family walking though the backyard of my rental. She and her kids drove all the way across town, and were so excited to finally find a nice home at a great price in this tight market. I hated to tell her that it was a scam. She was crushed. But fortunately I was there to warn her not to send anyone money. I now have a warning sign on the front door.
cool, I think that's a great idea. leaving a note in the property with my name and number and letting people know if you they have talked to anybody other than me, they may be getting scammed.. it's going on every where, where u @ Matt???
Today I noticed a family walking though the backyard of my rental. She and her kids drove all the way across town, and were so excited to finally find a nice home at a great price in this tight market. I hated to tell her that it was a scam. She was crushed. But fortunately I was there to warn her not to send anyone money. I now have a warning sign on the front door.
cool, I think that's a great idea. leaving a note in the property with my name and number and letting people know if you they have talked to anybody other than me, they may be getting scammed.. it's going on every where, where u @ Matt???
My wife and I have several rentals here in Phoenix. Our first one we hired a Realtor and for $300 she listed it on the MLS. All the people that looked at it were qualified and we had it rented in a couple of weeks.
As or RE business grew we both got our licenses and still use the MLS. We can put a Supra key on the property, only an agent can open this. When they do open it we get a showing report with the agents name ant the time they were there, allowing for easy follow up. Overall we have rented our properties quickly and the leads we get are usually pretty solid since no agent wants to wast time showing their client a rental they can't afford.
changing the combo every single time is one way to mitigate risk, but what if the 'potential tenant' has bad intention the first visit and totally stripe the property?
At first I thought the key box is a good idea, the more I think about it, the more scenario I can think of.
Wow, I had no idea there were *that* many people getting their pictures stolen and reposted in fake ads! I knew it happened but did not think it was this prevalent.
@Kris Haskins I never had a craigslist rental situation like that before, that had to be exciting!! But I have seen pictures of my properties on Craigslist with scamers trying to seller finance them. Thankfully nothing ever came of it I just reported it to craigslist and flagged the ads. I love the lock box idea but in my marketplace you will get cleaned out quick lol!!
How do you prevent them from making a copy of your key they extracted from the lockbox and come back two weeks later after you changed the combinations to clean out your property?
How do you prevent them from making a copy of your key they extracted from the lockbox and come back two weeks later after you changed the combinations to clean out your property?
Well Sam, I don't think you can stop them from doing that. In 10 years, this is the only time I've had anything remotely happen in a house. I'm going to change the lockbox code more frequently now, however. I guess the only thing they can take are the appliances.
changing the combo every single time is one way to mitigate risk, but what if the 'potential tenant' has bad intention the first visit and totally stripe the property?
At first I thought the key box is a good idea, the more I think about it, the more scenario I can think of.
Hey Bruce, how do u show your houses for rent/sale?
I am sorry, putting a lock box on the home is pure lazy. You get whatever comes with that and you just have to man up and own that. Glad it was avoided but that was preventable.
Oh and changing a code to a rolling code would not have done squat to have prevented this. You seem super sharp and caught it. Lesson Learned I hope. It only takes one really horrible situation like this to modify a policy. I am more curious if you will?
How do you prevent them from making a copy of your key they extracted from the lockbox and come back two weeks later after you changed the combinations to clean out your property?
Well Sam, I don't think you can stop them from doing that. In 10 years, this is the only time I've had anything remotely happen in a house. I'm going to change the lockbox code more frequently now, however. I guess the only thing they can take are the appliances.
Its so much easier to handle this situation if you install quick change lock sets like Landlord Locks. When the prior tenant moves out, you go over and change the locks to a "contractor" set of locks only used for vacant properties. Then, after signing a lease with the new tenant, you change from the "contractor" locks to a new set of locks for your rentals. I always change to the new lock set in front of my new tenants and show them that the old keys don't work, then have them initial on the lease that the locks have been changed.
FYI You no longer need to do that cumbersome process of changing locksets out. Kwikset sells a Smart Key system that lets you easily rekey the locks in seconds. You simply insert a working ket then the tool and then remove the old key and insert a new different key and bang your done...re-keyed. I have them on all my proerties and have about 12 key combos I rotate. Very simple do it yourself type of deal.
Hey @Jay C. , thanks for the heads up on the Smart Key system. I honestly have looked around for any alternatives in a few years. I don't know that I would call the Landlord Locks system cumbersome because I can change each lock in about 10-15 seconds. It would be nice not to have all those spare cylinders laying around. I assume you have to get key specialty key sets from Kwikset?