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Man loses thousands in Atlanta rental scam - YouTube
Channel: FOX 5 Atlanta
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well finding a house or an apartment to
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rent can put you in the crosshairs of a
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scam with little inventory and lots of
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interest
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scammers hope to rush your decision so
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you ignore red flags
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fox 5 i-team's dana fowle spoke with the
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young man taken for nearly two
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thousand dollars hate it for him dana
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i know but i'm so glad he reached out to
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us so we could tell you and that was his
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goal
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rafael webster you're about to meet him
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he has a new baby he works full-time
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he's got a tight budget in a very
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expensive city
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but he found something in decatur it was
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perfect
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or so he thought
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i was i was man i can't even explain
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i was loving it i had a home warming
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housewarming party everybody came by
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brought gifts and everything it was real
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nice man
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and with the new baby making a home in a
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safe neighborhood was important to
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raphael webster
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was the price right yes ma'am i thought
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it was a good deal
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what was the d how much was it a
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thousand dollar a month
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1700 down payment realtor alex wilkinson
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manages the property i listed on a
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monday
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and i had 130 inquiries that day wow
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i've never seen anything like it
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and he rented this decatur home but not
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to rafael
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when we got there we opened the front
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door and walked in
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and there was furniture there and
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somebody was living in the property i've
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been in here
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at least a week before they came rafael
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discovered that day
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he'd been scanned he told us what he
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told police investigators that he found
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an ad for the home online
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called the number then went to see the
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property
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alex wilkinson the realtor said this has
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happened to him twice
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in a month he said in both cases the
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home had a self-touring lock box
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he says he doesn't use these any longer
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on his rentals because of the scam
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potential
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you get the rentals key by uploading
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your id to an app to prove who you are
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and then you get a code
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to access the house key in the box and
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then you're in
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what these con artists are doing is
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they're going on that website they're
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finding out
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which properties have these boxes and
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then they're running ads for these
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properties and then they're telling the
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potential tenant to remove the key from
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the lock box once they've wired the
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money
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often the new renter is paid has a key
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now and moves in before realizing
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they've been taken for thousands of
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dollars raphael webster now recognizes
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the red flags
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non-traceable payment using wire or
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money transfers even payment apps
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he also never met the man who said he
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owned the property
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all the business was done on the phone
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the fact that i never met him was kind
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of a red flag but he used to like the
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pandemic
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and the price was too good well below
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market value
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and he never cross-checked the listing
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which means simply
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googling the address to see if there are
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multiple listings
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if he had he would have found the real
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more expensive
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ad don't wire anybody money unless
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you've met them
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or you've verified they are who they say
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they are
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now raphael tells me that alex the
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realtor was so nice to him about this
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whole thing and understood and gave him
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some time to find a new place
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but the realtor tells me he stopped
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using these sort of show yourself in
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boxes
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because of the scan potential because
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you know there's a backlog in evictions
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and
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the next person might not be as
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compliant about
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moving along at least yeah maybe not
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okay so it really does seem though dana
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that uh
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googling the address could be a quick
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and easy way to find out if it's a scam
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right
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you know i did that i had a house on the
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market a couple years ago and i
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immediately
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put in the search engine my address and
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i mean within 24 hours
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my home for sale was a rental so
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it was a scam immediately all you got to
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do
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is search it search the address see how
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many times it pops
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up see it's connected to it's so easy
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worth doing that to save yourself money
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time
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all of that goodness gracious wow all
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right all of it
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thank you for the help we appreciate it
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