Greetings. With the housing market in meltdown, there are vast numbers of persons currently in motion from one residence to another, sometimes in desperate situations. This has opened the door for all sorts of scams, including an Internet-enabled version of the classic 419 "advance-fee" fraud, now directed at local rental real estate instead of promising multi-million dollar payoffs.

I ran into this myself over the weekend. I was helping a friend try to find a house to lease here in L.A. on a very restricted budget. One particular newly posted Craigslist ad that met my search parameters got my attention immediately.

The initial problem was that it appeared to be too good. The lease price seemed way out of line -- far too low -- for the property and location (even taking into account its location very close to a freeway). Still, you never know.

My friend contacted the party listing the ad via e-mail (Note 1: No phone number provided -- though that's not so unusual with Craigslist ads).

Replies came back promptly from a party claiming they had to move suddenly to Kentucky, confirming the low price, and sounding all gung-ho to rent.

Note 2: E-mail correspondent was using a Yahoo mail address

Note 3: E-mail correspondents' e-mail address name and "real name" displayed were not quite the same.

Note 4: E-mail correspondents' language and phrasing "I had to move quickly here with my only daughter" -- etc. -- were highly reminiscent of 419 scam wordings in tone and feel, just in a new context.

Note 5: A real deal like that would have been snapped up in five minutes. But the
correspondent acted as if they had no other inquiries.

My friend was immediately provided with the street address of the property (a bit surprising). Searching on that address found other listings for the property, but
with major variations in statistics like house size, and at almost three times the asking price for the lease that was quoted in the original Craigslist ad.

It seems clear what's going on. Someone, probably offshore, has "scraped" real online ads for that house, created their own fake listings, and is trying to get people, probably multiple victims, to wire them "deposits" and personal information to supposedly lease the house -- a house with which they have no legal connection.

I have a title search in progress. If nothing else I'd like to notify the true owner of this property about what's going on. But I naturally have now recommended to my friend -- who was already suspicious -- that they forget about any further contacts regarding this particular house (any leads from the readership regarding affordable rental housing here in L.A. will be gratefully accepted).

The moral of this story is as old as human history. If a deal looks too good to be true, it almost certainly isn't legitimate. Human nature always pushes us to hope that we've found an exception to that rule -- but that's a rare circumstance indeed.

Buyer -- and renter -- beware!

--Lauren--