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Vacation Rental Scams - Part 2

By CottageGuru | November 23, 2007

In my previous post about rental scams I mentioned how they generally work to fraudulently get money from vacation rental owners. I’ve had a few scam emails this week so thought I’d do a quick analysis to show you what to look for.. Although each one I get is slightly different, there are similarities in each that make them really easy to spot.

Hello
We need a reservation for 31 days in your timeshare for 4 persons.

Details of the reservation as follows:
Number of people arriving: 4 (adults)
Number of rooms: Apartment or double rooms
Kindly tell me when will be free for 31 days in your place between JAN 10TH to FEB 11TH 2008 just give me a good date
Please get back to me soonest as I await to hear from you.
Regards,
RIckey.

Greetings,

How are you today ? We have a number of 3 couples coming for accommodation in your property for the dates January 4th - 12th 2008.

Kindly get back to me if you have the dates required and also do you accept credit cards for payment ?

Regards.

Donald phillips

Tel : +44 7045766435
Fax : +447075020654

Suspicion triggers:

Asking for a period of time longer than a week

These scams usually require accommodation for 10 days or 31 days. I’m not sure why they choose these numbers but it seems to be common to many of them. Owners get interested because the thought of renting a longer period of time in the low season is very attractive. However the second example is for just a week so be aware that the enquiries sometimes sound relatively genuine.

Using an expression such as “timeshare’ or “lodgings” or “your property”

It seems fairly clear the scammer has no idea what type of accommodation you are offering. Not using the expression “cottage” when looking for an Ontario vacation home, is a good giveaway.

Any indication they have not read your listing i.e. asking for “apartment” or an amount of “double rooms”.

When it sounds as though they are booking an hotel room for other people, you can be fairly sure it’s not a genuine enquiry. As my point above, it’s often clear they haven’t read your listing.

Stilted language, poor grammar and use of non-English expressions

This is a bit of a tough one because you’ll get many genuine enquiries that come from people with English as their second language. The giveaway is when you notice the poor use of language together with the other scam signs mentioned here.

Sign-off triggers

The first example just uses a single name which is unusual. The last few I’ve received have got full name and address details, usually from UK and Scotland. Using Dr. as a title is common.

For a good range of examples and a breakdown of how this all works, Find Rentals has a comprehensive explanation.

Topics: Marketing |

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