Gender: Male
Location: Currently in Sao Paulo, Brazil
Occupation: Graduate School/EFL Teacher
Age: 23
Member Since: May 20, 2012
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Hi, 20/m
I'm a small town boy, soon to be moving to a big city. I'm trying to look for a room in an apartment, and have been looking on craigslist.
I've never done this sort of thing before, and so I'm a bit confused.
Some of the pictures look like they've been taken off a website i.e. they look like billionaire penthouses. Are these scams? Is there any damage in contacting them?
Also, any other tips you could give me when searching for a place on craigslist? I.e. what to look for, what to avoid, how to tell if its fake/a scam?
Any help is much appreciated!
Thanks (link)
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I've found apartments on craigslist before. It's not necessarily a scam. They hire professional photographers and interior designers to make the apartments look as nice as they can. I would be careful though.
Never give your credit card/bank information to them over the telephone. They may ask for your SSN as well to perform a credit check. None of this should be done over the phone.
Tell them you want a tour of the apartment, they should set up a time and date no questions ask. If they ask for any personal information beyond your name and contact information, hang up the phone.
Also ask them if they can give you the names of some residents that you can contact as references, or while you're looking at the apartment, try and stop a resident and ask them their opinion of the building. Try to do this when the person giving you the tour isn't right there so they don't feel pressured to be overly positive.
I would watch out for anything that seems too good to be true. After looking at a bunch of apartments, you should have a pretty good idea of what an apartment costs. If anything is significantly below that value, it's probably a scam.
I signed a lease at an apartment like that. The tour was great, I asked one resident and she said it was pretty good but that there was kind of a "bug problem". I imagined the odd cricket or roach getting in and signed the lease. The first night in I turned on my kitchen light and literally hundreds of roaches went scurrying into the corners. I was out of there by the end of the week. (I had to claim the apartment was unlivable and threaten legal action to get out of the contract, and I still lost my deposit.)
As long as you follow those steps: Don't give out information over the phone, request a tour, speak with a resident, and watch out for deals that are "too good to be true".
As a last bit of advice. Make sure when you do sign a contract and give them your information that you do so in their office. It should either be located in the apartment complex or separately if they manage a number of properties. Make sure it appears to be an actual management office (staff, file cabinets, break room, etc.) This sounds like common sense, and it's extremely rare that a scammer would go as far as to create a fake office, but it always pays to do your research.
Also, you can look up who the biggest realtors are in the city you're moving to and look at apartments directly through their site. Good luck, and don't stress out too much.
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Rating: 5
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Great advice! Very detailed, and the personal experiences help! Thanks! :)
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