I am taking my family to Florida this week for a last-minute getaway. I have a nice hotel suite booked, but I am still looking around for a great deal on a condo.
I took a look at Craigslist and found some real bargains. I sent a couple of email inquiries about our specific dates.
One of the people replied back and said the dates were available and some other specifics. I asked some questions about the rental house, because this guy called it an 'apartment' in his reply. He replied that it was in fact a house, but he calls it 'apartment' in English (suggesting it is not his native language). OK whatever. After talking with my wife, I replied and told him that we were going to pass because we have small children and the place looks like it has breakable items all around. He replied that he didn't understand...
I replied with a clarification about the risk of small children around breakable items. And I also asked why he told me the house was 900sq feet but then I google the address, I see a Trulia listing of the same address that is 1296 square feet (this is clearly a different home).
No response. I know it was a scammer, as he already sent me the rental agreement complete with "Payment is only accepted via Western Union". Obviously a scam...I have rented plenty of vacation homes and have only used check or credit card.
So this is why CL has cracked down so spammers/scammers...because these assholes scam people out of their money. These aren't just spammers pushing CPA and leadgen forms. These are thieves. A quick search of this stuff shows many news articles about it. I can see these guys making tons of money from it by just posting these ads and replying to emails all day. But they are flat-out stealing and really ruining peoples' vacations in a nasty way. Karma will not be good for those guys.
I took a look at Craigslist and found some real bargains. I sent a couple of email inquiries about our specific dates.
One of the people replied back and said the dates were available and some other specifics. I asked some questions about the rental house, because this guy called it an 'apartment' in his reply. He replied that it was in fact a house, but he calls it 'apartment' in English (suggesting it is not his native language). OK whatever. After talking with my wife, I replied and told him that we were going to pass because we have small children and the place looks like it has breakable items all around. He replied that he didn't understand...
I replied with a clarification about the risk of small children around breakable items. And I also asked why he told me the house was 900sq feet but then I google the address, I see a Trulia listing of the same address that is 1296 square feet (this is clearly a different home).
No response. I know it was a scammer, as he already sent me the rental agreement complete with "Payment is only accepted via Western Union". Obviously a scam...I have rented plenty of vacation homes and have only used check or credit card.
So this is why CL has cracked down so spammers/scammers...because these assholes scam people out of their money. These aren't just spammers pushing CPA and leadgen forms. These are thieves. A quick search of this stuff shows many news articles about it. I can see these guys making tons of money from it by just posting these ads and replying to emails all day. But they are flat-out stealing and really ruining peoples' vacations in a nasty way. Karma will not be good for those guys.
