Source: Reddit |
Scam Type: Romance |
Amount Lost: Amount not specified |
Date: March 24, 2026
I know there are a LOT of scams when it comes to housing rental listings on Craigslist, but this one has me perplexed and I would love to hear your theories. I responded by email to a CL post for a basement suite in a house off Renfrew & 2nd Ave in Vancouver. They replied asking if I could view it at 5:15pm that day. I replied yes, and they emailed again shortly after and asked could it be closer to 5:20pm, I said no problem. I also provided my phone number. Around 3:00pm I got a text confirming I was still on for 5:15pm viewing, I said yes. The number I was texting with said "ok Frank will be there to show you the place on arrival" so it was clear I was texting with someone other than the person who would be showing it, I assumed a property manager of some sort. We arrived at the property on time at 5:15pm and texted "here!". Waited a good 5 to 10 minutes with no response and no Frank to be seen, and I texted "should I knock on the door?". We knocked on the front and back door, no response. It was a newly built duplex type house with basement suites on both sides in the back. The place seemed super unoccupied, all 4 units, every window and blind was shut, no signs of life and there were security cameras EVERYWHERE, like a creepy amount of cameras. Finally got a text back "Frank is running late, stuck in traffic, ETA 5:34" Ok, annoying but no worries, we popped around the corner to a store to for 10 minutes or so to kill time. Then suddenly we're getting texts "where are you". I said "right around the corner, back in less than 5". I mean this guy has already made us wait 20 minutes, we were there at the scheduled time. We raced back there. Next second they're texting me, "Frank is gone". Ok so this alleged Frank person drove all the way to meet us there, apparently stuck in traffic, was 20 minutes late, and couldn't wait 2 minutes while we were literally around the corner 2 blocks away, waiting for him to arrive this whole time? And he just leaves? I text back, "are you for real? is this some sort of scam? you've wasted our entire afternoon". I tried calling the number that had been texting me, and it just made a bizarre dial tone type sound and did not ring. They texted asking to reschedule me for another viewing. I declined, and reported the listing to Craigslist as a scam (they didn't respond or take it down or do anything). Even the photos looked super weird, like they were AI generated, the kitchen looks slightly different from one photo to the next, almost like they're mock-up photos of when they were building the place or something. I've attached them. The whole thing has given me SUCH bad vibes. Was this "Frank" character coming to rob us blind? Were they going to hold us hostage and extort us or something? Were they watching us on the cameras the entire time? Or do I just watch too much True Crime? I know a lot of scammers on CL are trying to collect your info - well they already had that - so why lure me out to the weird