A St. Augustine couple was scrolling through Craigslist looking for a home to rent when they found a listing they were interested in.
They were told the home was $1,200 a month and they’d have to send $700 dollars to get the set of keys.
Officer Mark Samson said that was their first suspicion that something didn’t seem right.
“First it was 'can you send my wife $700 as a deposit?' The second was 'well I’m in Texas and my wife’s in Mexico,'” said Samson.
Action News Jax spoke with the couple off camera and they showed us the emails that went back and forth. The husband wrote to the alleged renter saying:
“I’m sorry but I won’t send all that money first. We don’t feel right.”
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The alleged renter then came up with a new amount writing, “If you just come up with the $400 first so we can send the keys to your address.”
After the exchange, the couple did more research and learned the real listing was on Zillow for $1,625 a month and that the man they were talking to was a fraud.
The Better Business Bureau said they issued a nationwide alert about these scams in March, and that they see them occurring more during the summer in areas where tourists are likely to visit.
Officers put out a warning to locals on Facebook.
“People’s money is really hard to come by nowadays. People are working hard and I hate to see them lose it through a scam like that,” said Samson.
We tried emailing and calling the scammer, but the phone number was no longer working.
We’ve spoke with the actual property management company. They said they hadn’t heard about it but are letting their leasing team know and looking into it.