Rental Scam takes Arizona Family for $1800

AAR recently published news an Arizona Couple was taken for $1800 on a Rental Scam. The scam was setup with a phony Real Estate Agent who posted a “for rent” sign in front a vacant home. The home wasn’t his listing, it wasn’t even listed for rent. The property was a short sale. Since the agent had access to the home via,  he showed the home impersonated himself as the management company and collected first and last months rent from the family. The family was in the process of moving in when they were stopped by the real listing agent. The family had no way of recouping the money lost and were forced to move all the stuff they had moved in back out.

How this could have been prevented

This is a stretch but if AAR mandated listed properties with the ARMLS had to be Supra Lock Boxes, we wouldn’t have this problem. Each Lock box records the agents using it and there’s no room for anyone to scam people like this supposed agent did. The big issue now, is most lock boxes on bank owned properties or short sales are cheap lockboxes and require no setting of combination. Which means, they’re all the same code!