Five Money Scams to Watch Out for on Craigslist Philadelphia

If you haven’t used Craigslist lately, it’s still an amazing place to advertise real estate for sale or rent or any other goods or services that you have available. It gets the information out to a large viewing audience, but it’s important to be on the lookout for scammers. In the past few years, fraudulent activity has been on the rise on the advertising site and there are some vicious crooks out there who have mastered the skill of swindling innocent victims out of their money. Here are five money scams to watch out for on Craigslist Philadelphia.

1. Mom and daughter homeless because of Craigslist Philadelphia scam

The mother of a mentally disabled daughter in Northeast Philadelphia fell victim to a rotten scam that left her and her child homeless. She was the victim of a rental scam that was being run through Craigslist. She followed up on an ad that offered a home for rent at 6829 Horrocks Steet. A woman named Nicky told the woman that she could move into a room in the home for just under $700 per month, but that her sister would be living in one of the rooms. After the woman gave her the money and moved in she and her daughter moved into the residence. They were only there for three days when they learned that Nicky did not have a rental contract for the home and she wasn’t the owner either. She didn’t even have any keys.
This left the woman and her daughter homeless because the owner of the property was really a man from Brooklyn, New York who had no idea of what was going on. Police are investigating the rental scam and are currently pursuing a warrant for the arrest of the woman who accepted the money fraudulently.

2. Rental scam in Philly

Harry Moore was arrested for conducting a rip off rental scam that robbed his victims of tens of thousands of dollars. Moore scammed 15 people by advertising a house that he owns in West Oak Lane. He placed an ad on Craigslist and other sites and then accepted deposit funds from renters, then vanished, never giving them the keys. Upon his arrest, he confessed to bilking all fifteen victims out of their money and explained that he used to money to pay gambling debts. His actions left many of the victims homeless and he now faces fraud and theft charges.

3. Woman scammed out of $200 on Craigslist Philadelphia

A woman shared that she fell for a bait and switch con game that was advertised on Craigslist. After her father lost his iPhone, she placed an ad on Craigslist Philadelphia. She explained the situation in the ad hoping that someone would return the phone as her father had left it on top of his car and driven away. She got a call in response to the ad and a man told her that he thought he had her dad’s phone. he described the phone to her during the call and told her a story of how he was visiting family and bought the phone from some kid on the street. The man said he was in North Carolina. He told the victim that if she would wire money to him Western Union he would send the phone overnight. She sent $200 to cover the cost of what he’d paid for the phone plus shipping. It turned out to be a total scam and after the phone didn’t arrive, she knew that she’d been taken for $200 bucks.

4. High-tech scam on Craigslist

The old Nigerian rental scam is still alive and well and a Philadelphia reporter is bringing it to everyone in the area’s attention because even though this particular rental scam happened in 2011, it’s still going on in many different forms. Cheap apartments are listed and they’re so affordably priced that they seem too good to be true. The apartments really exist and there are addresses and pictures to prove it, but the scammers have stolen the information from other websites and reposted the properties that they don’t even own to collect damage deposits and first and last month’s rent from their victims. The scammers are actually many miles away and they conduct these flim-flam jobs remotely. They’ll even give telephone numbers in some cases and talk to their victims. Some other scammers insist on using email or texts only. They usually give a sob story, or somehow bring God into it as though they are religious to fool their victims.

5. Victims speak out, tired of Craigslist scams

This person has had enough of the money scams being posted on Craigslist Philadelphia. They give the name of the scammer, or the name that he uses as Jon Carr or Cam Davis, along with the IP address and the email that he’s using. It’s a scam that offers event tickets at a discounted price. It’s a total scam. The ad goes as far as to list the license and bond registration numbers to trick people into buying tickets that are not authentic and worthless. The Federal Trade Commission is working to track this scammer down and bring him to justice for ripping people off.