Nashville rental scam

I received an e-mail from Michael who was looking for a condo in Nashville and found one that was too good to be true. When he e-mailed the ‘seller’ this was the response he got.

Hello,

Thanks for your response regarding your interest in having my apartment for rent.The apartment is much available for now.I want you to know that I amthe owner of this building .But right now i am in africa on a Christain mission with my wife and we have the keys right here with us.I will like toinform you that it was due to my transfer that makes us to leave the apartment and also want to give it out for rent and looking for a resposible person that can take very good care of it as we are not after the money for the rent but want it to be clean at the time and the person that will rent it to take it as if it were its own.So for now,We are here in West Africa,NIGERIA our new house and also with the keys of the house,we are trying to look for an agent that we can give this document before we left but could not see and we are as well as dont want our house to be used any how in our absent that is why we took it along with us here.We are only willing to give the apartment out to a lovely and caring family only, so if you know you cannot give the apartment the neatness it deserves please don’t contact me.But if you promise to always take good

care of apartment,get back to me on how you could take care of our house or perhaps experience you have in renting home.Hope you are okay with the price of $650 with hydro,heat laundry facilities,air-condition and so on.i look forward to hearing from you ASAP so that i can forward you an application to fill out and discuss on how to get the apartment for rent,also are you ready to rent it now or when?

Thanks,

Marcie anderson.

So we can add Marcie Anderson to the list of fake scammer names.

Michael e-mailed Mrs. ‘Anderson’ back and then ‘she’ requested the usual personal information for identity theft purposes. Michael did not e-mail her back of course and he notes that the ad was removed the day after.

Let’s go over the red flags again…

• Broken English: The apartment is much available for now.

• Christian Mission: If there were as many Christian missionaries as they claim to be on craigslist the entire continent of Africa would be Christian.

• Africa: Especially Nigeria, the birthplace of internet scams.

• Asking for money sight unseen: It doesn’t matter how desperate you are for a place, never rent without seeing the inside of the place first.

And remember the old saying applies true even more with craigslist, if it looks too good to be true it probably is.