Bogus Landlords
Renting Out Vacant Houses
By Daniel Muniz

Bold con artists are posing as landlords of vacant houses they don’t own or are not authorized to manage and finding renters to move into them. The crooks disappear after taking the security deposit and first month’s rent while the renters are subsequently thrown out when the real owners show up.

The way it works is that every major and medium sized city has thousands of vacant houses.

For example, in the metropolitan area of Cleveland Ohio, there are approximately 10,000 untenanted houses which mean that there are plenty of empty homes throughout the city. And after every red hot housing market the country experiences the inevitable bust which is just part of the natural business cycle. The aftermath of such a bust also means that there are an abnormally large number of unoccupied properties due to foreclosures.
 

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In addition, there are also plenty of houses in which there is no clear title because a will was not written or it is being contested by various family members. Either way, it has turned into a messy issue that the heirs and the probate courts have yet to settle and could take years to resolve. And even if someone properly inherited an estate, he or she may not have a clue with what to do with that property for the time being. Also, some people still haven’t decided what they may end up doing with a house they own but haven’t lived in for years so it sits vacant.

Regardless of the reason, every city has so many of these empty houses.

Con artists take full advantage of these muddied circumstances to ply their scheme on unsuspecting victims.

Since this is a country where people don’t know who their neighbors are especially with a house that has been vacant for years, crooks are able to carry out their swindles with ease. Unless someone in the neighborhood personally knows the owner of the unoccupied property, the fraudster can openly change out the locks and briefly tidy up the exterior and interior without attracting any undue attention. Also, because this is a rip off, there is not a whole lot of time and effort that will be made to make the house look any more presentable than it has to be.

Sadly, the seedier the neighborhood is means that hardly anyone on the block barely does any upkeep on their property and they are also not inclined to inquire about whatever goes on next door. As a result, a con artist can better pull off this scam in a shabbier part of town with less than $20 for new locks.

Next, since the fraudsters are looking for easy money, they want tenants who are not going to ask very many questions.

The easiest people to victimize are the ones who already have bad credit or have a history of breaking leases so they will be avoiding the properties that are run by professional management firms or the landlords who check everything. In addition, there are also people who want to get a good deal so they are more open to finding rentals in the newspaper classified section or on flyers on bulletin boards.

So whatever the weakness a potential tenant may have, the crook will exploit it which helps the scheme run smoother.

And finally, money is exchanged but it is almost always done in cash. Thieves usually work on a cash basis system because they don’t want the kind of paper trail and the verification that accompanies a check.

The bogus landlord then hands over the house keys along with a receipt and promptly disappears.

For some tenants, the uncovering of the scam happens almost immediately when the real owners show up and demand to know why a family has moved into their house. And for some of the owners, they will bring the police along with them.

So not only is the tenant devastated to learn that he or she has been hoodwinked by a phony landlord, they are also out of the cash they put down which usually includes a security deposit and the rent for the first month. And they are also out of any money spent for utilities that required a deposit.

Regrettably, most con artists are adept at living on the fringes of society which makes apprehending them by local law enforcement almost impossible. Consequently, many of these scammers are never caught.

Although it is very traumatic to be duped into losing money and then not having a place to live at afterwards, there are a few things that can be done to help prevent from being swindled.

The first step is to demand a written rental agreement. Every rental should have one and if a landlord only wants to use a verbal agreement, then there is a right to be suspicious. And even with a legal agreement in hand, it doesn’t take much effort to check the local courthouse to see who really owns the property and if it is in foreclosure. In fact for most cities, that information is now available online so verifying is quick and easy. There is absolutely no need to pay a dime for any rent until that information has been checked out.

Next and most importantly, pay everything with a check. And if it is not a rental company that you are writing out a check to, then be sure to use the landlord’s first and last name for the check. In case anything funny happens, there is now a paper trail that law enforcement can follow up on. If the landlord balks or refuses a check because he or she will only accept cash, then there is a legitimate right to be concerned.

It is unfortunate that there are miscreants who will con people out of their money in the most ingenious duplicitous way. This scam is truly awful because of how it targets the ordinary folks who only want to find a place to live.

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