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Airbnb rental scam [split topic]

Started by Blue Jam, November 17, 2021, 08:20:51 AM

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Blue Jam

Here in Embra scammers are now nicking photos off Airbnb, posting them to Facebook and pretending they're they owner and the flat is to let, then booking it for long enough to show a few would-be tenants round before taking deposits from them and fucking off:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-59262549

Fucking cheers Airbnb.

Icehaven

#1
The article seems to deliberately avoid saying this particular flat was on Airbnb. I mean it probably was, and it mentions how many Edinburgh flats are on it, but it doesn't expressly say this one was. Wonder if Airbnb are getting a bit litigious about being blamed for stuff like this happening, even though their business model virtually encourages it.

And not to victim blame of course but this;
QuoteThe advert told them they would pay £950 per month for rent and bills. It was an attractive price in a city where average rent alone for two-bedroom flats is £1,041.

should have set the alarm bells ringing like mad. Spose that's how they lure students/younger people not yet aware of the brutal greed of the rental market. It's absolutely the case of it looks too good to be true then it is, you simply don't get mysterious bargains.


Edit; Tony the dupe should have found that bit in the text from "William" about the brochures suspicious. Presumably they were welcome brochures/tourist information for Airbnb guests that obviously the scammer didn't want potential "tenants" to see, but Tony would have seen them when he put them away. Mind you he was cheerfully employed by people he'd never met or even spoken to, so he's either a bit daft or he suspected it might be dodgy but didn't really care until the victims all started contacting him.

popcorn

This happened to me a few months ago. A couple arrived with suitcases having paid several thousand pounds on AirBnB to rent my flat for a few months. They already knew something dodgy was going on because no one had come to meet them at the station as promised. It was a lot of work to convince them that I wasn't in on this scam and that they had to please leave me alone and call the police.

A few months later I was randomly browsing Facebook Marketplace and saw my flat advertised for rent again. Managed to nip that in the bud but ffs.

Quote from: icehaven on November 17, 2021, 10:09:05 AM

Spose that's how they lure students/younger people not yet aware of the brutal greed of the rental market. It's absolutely the case of it looks too good to be true then it is, you simply don't get mysterious bargains.

My flat was advertised at 50% of what I'm actually paying for it. Rates I can only dream of.

JamesTC

Quote from: popcorn on November 17, 2021, 10:19:43 AM

My flat was advertised at 50% of what I'm actually paying for it. Rates I can only dream of.

You could save a fortune if you rent your place through them instead.

Icehaven

When we'd been in the last flat we lived in for just over a year we noticed it being advertised for let in the window of a different letting agency to the one we were renting through. No idea what was going on there, if the landlord used a few agencies and that one just hadn't changed their window ads for ages, or if they were using it as a lure (it was a shitty flat but in an inexplicably (to me anyway) popular location) and had nicked the pictures from the internet or what. I would have gone in and asked them but it was during Covid so you had to make an appointment, and I couldn't really be arsed ringing them, I wasn't that interested. We lived there for another 7 months or so and never had anyone turning up on the doorstep expecting to move in so I don't think it was anything dodgy. 

idunnosomename

I have just put internet celebrity popcorn's arse on JustPark. Already rented it out to a Buick for a fortnight.

Icehaven

Quote from: popcorn on November 17, 2021, 10:19:43 AM
This happened to me a few months ago. A couple arrived with suitcases having paid several thousand pounds on AirBnB to rent my flat for a few months. They already knew something dodgy was going on because no one had come to meet them at the station as promised. It was a lot of work to convince them that I wasn't in on this scam and that they had to please leave me alone and call the police.

It's not funny at all but I can't help but smile at their thought that you'd rip them off then sit in the flat waiting for them to turn up.

imitationleather

Fucking hell, going by the types who were renting the flat next door when it was an AirBnB, I would have absolutely hated to have needed to have an argument with them about something like that. It would have been groups of lads on stag weekends just barging past me and then jumping on my bed and knocking all the pictures off the wall and diddling my cats and all-sorts.

I hate AirBnB to the point where when I get to go to places again I might even take a moral stance and boycott it. Imagine that!

mothman

AirBnB feels so prone to scams I'd never use it myself, but I get why people are drawn to using it. If it's a form of privilege to be able to afford more reliable services, then I'll own that.

We usually go to the same place in Greece for our holidays, and we book direct through the owners. We know what we're getting. But the first time we went, it was a leap of faith - we'd booked through ownersdirect.com, a place with its own problems with scammers. Were fully bracing ourselves to turn up and find it didn't exist. Fortunately we'd asked to pay cash on arrival (though lugging around more than a thousand Euros was nerve-wracking in itself) so would have just been out the deposit if it had been dodgy.