Scam with renting houses in the south. How to protect yourself from fraud when renting an apartment

No matter how it is. Renting a home is one of the most common transactions in the real estate market. And an unplowed field for scammers of all stripes. Dishonest apartment owners, black realtors and enterprising swindlers show enviable ingenuity in deceiving gullible tenants. They have dozens of different schemes in their arsenal: from unprovable “everyday misunderstandings” to real criminal acts. The higher the legal literacy of the population, the more cunning the deceivers. An educational program will help you rent an apartment without adventures and financial losses. GdeEtoDom.RU analyzed some common methods of rental fraud, here they are:

Selling information - “cheap cheese” for tenants

One of the most mass species deception in the housing market - trading information from supposedly closed real estate databases. Clients buy into the offer of cheap real estate services, but in the end they simply lose money. Such fraud can be virtual and real.

SMS mailings

A person is looking for housing for rent via the Internet, and in order to communicate with realtors or landlords, he leaves his contact information on specialized websites or forums. After this he receives a message via e-mail or an SMS with an offer to gain access to the most attractive real estate options exactly according to his request. To do this, you just need to send a message to the scammers’ number. Naturally, the SMS turns out to be paid, and in return the gullible citizen does not receive any “exclusive” information.

Real estate information agencies

Fraudsters rent an office and pretend to be a real estate company. They offer citizens intermediary services - they provide apartment addresses for a reasonable fee. In this case, the amount is approximately half the standard fee of a real estate agent. The savings are explained by the fact that an agency employee does not travel to view and deal.

The client comes to the office, enters into an agreement for services and receives a list of addresses and telephone numbers. Usually, to divert attention, scammers immediately agree to view one of the apartments. The happy tenant pays the “realtors” and signs a document stating that the obligations to him have been fulfilled.

When a person arrives at the place, it turns out that the housing has already been rented out or the price is significantly higher than that indicated by the agency. The situation is repeated at other addresses on the list. At the same time, it is almost impossible to make a claim to fraudsters: such an “agency” provides only an information service and is not responsible for the success of the transaction.

Don't forget the saying about where the free cheese is. It’s not in vain that professional realtors charge money for their work - they guarantee the security of the transaction at all stages: from searching for housing to concluding an agreement and transferring money. In addition, honest agents do not take money up front. Payment for a realtor's services for a completed transaction always occurs after fulfilling obligations to the client.

If you are unable to pay agent fees, you will have to look for housing yourself - on specialized websites in open real estate databases. At the same time, it is cheap and safe to rent housing only from friends or relatives without a contract.

Illegal subletting - apartments through third parties

Apartment for the day

As a rule, the victims of deception are careless people who do not check the housing documents of their landlords. Fraudsters rent an apartment daily and then publish an ad for long-term rental. At the same time, an artificial excitement is created around the apartment: an attractive option is offered for rent for modest money, and several applicants are invited to view at once (some of which may be fake).

The “owner” of the property tells tales that he is urgently leaving the city, so he will rent out the apartment today - to the first applicant. As a result, potential tenants begin to compete with each other and go into a frenzy. And at the stage of signing the contract, it turns out that the lessor accidentally “forgot” the ownership documents or took only copies with him. Many tenants by this point want to rent an apartment so much that they take their word for it - they sign the papers and give the money no matter what. After this, the scammer disappears, and after a few days the deceived people are surprised to meet the real owners of the home.

Multiple rentals

Often, criminals manage to re-let an apartment to several gullible tenants at once - they defraud some in the morning, others at lunch, others in the evening... All these people receive the keys and expect to move in the next day. But instead they encounter fellow sufferers at the door. An indirect evidence of such a scam may be a request to pay several months in advance.

Overpayment to the swindler

According to the same principle, apartments are illegally subleased, only the fake “owner” does not disappear immediately, but takes money from the tenants for quite a long time. A person rents a house and pretends to be the owner of the property. At the same time, he pays 20 thousand rubles for rent to the current owner, takes 30 thousand rubles from new tenants, and puts the difference in his pocket. Defrauded tenants not only overpay - they live in the apartment “with bird rights”, because the agreement with the scammer is invalid.

How to avoid becoming a victim of scammers?

Typically, such fraud schemes are quite primitive - scammers rely on the inexperience and gullibility of their victims. It is not so difficult to see through the deception - it is enough to demand all the papers for the apartment, the owner’s passport and ask a few leading questions about the apartment that only the real owner can know.

However, increasingly, criminals resort to more sophisticated forgery: they forge original documents or “draw” photocopies of the certificate of ownership of housing on a computer, and then laminate them for clarity. Fraudsters can work in pairs: a fake “owner” shows the papers, and a “realtor” checks their authenticity. In this case, you can only rely on intuition or rent a home only with the help of trusted real estate agents.

Deception from the owner - scammers among homeowners

Collusion between master and agent

One of the common types of rental fraud is making money from agents. The scheme is quite profitable: the property owner and realtor rent out an apartment, split the agent’s fee, and then evict the tenant under a flimsy pretext. After that, they look for new unhappy tenants and make double the profit. The profit is considerable: usually, the agent’s work rate is equal to the monthly cost of living.

A standard rental agreement states that the landlord can terminate the agreement without financial loss in four cases:

if the tenant is three days late in payment
due to property damage
due to systematic violation of the rights of neighbors (noise, unsanitary conditions)
due to use of the apartment for other purposes

Greedy landlords come up with amazingly clever schemes to keep honest tenants out. ahead of schedule. They spare no effort to create unbearable conditions for the tenants. On the forums you can find stories about secret damage to furniture, bribery of local homeless people who pretend to be “friends” of the tenant, make noise in the entrance and turn neighbors against him, and even artificially provoked utility accidents. After this, the owners arrange an unscheduled inspection at the most inopportune time, act out righteous anger and force the residents to move out.

In communal apartments, neighbors may participate in collusion. Methods of dealing with conscientious tenants can be the most unsightly - right down to dead mice in the soup in the common kitchen.

Rent bypassing relatives

Tenants often become victims of family conflicts. They rent an apartment from the owner, check all the documents, enter into an agreement... But they do not attach importance to the fact that the apartment is shared ownership by several people. Later it turns out that one of the owners decided to rent out the property without the knowledge of the other and not share the profit, a scandal arises.

In most of these situations, the landlord does not consider himself a scammer. He really didn’t intend to deceive the tenant.. He just hoped for chance. And another interested party unexpectedly came to visit or learned about everything from neighbors.

In any case, it’s not a pleasant experience for the innocent residents. At a minimum, they will face a scandal when they first meet, and possibly communication with the police. Then everything will depend on whether the relatives can settle the matter peacefully. IN otherwise tenants will either be forced to move out (the agreement is not valid without the consent of all owners), or will be required to pay more for housing - taking into account the interests of the other owner.

Repairs at the expense of the tenant

Often, property owners use tenants as free labor. If the apartment or room is in very poor condition, you can make repairs and invest in building materials and workers... Or you can rent out the property for pennies to gullible tenants, who will gradually put everything in order on their own.

At the same time, the owners convince residents that the property is rented out for a long term. They even agree to partially finance construction materials: buy wallpaper, paint or glue. Many people are happy to agree to such a scheme: they like the idea of paying cheap rent and making repairs themselves to their taste. To lull the vigilance of tenants, the parties enter into an agreement for 11 months with the possibility of extension. At the same time, people expect to settle in an apartment for several years, so they try: they whitewash the ceilings and paint the walls “for themselves.”

Further, when the repairs are completed and the housing has acquired a more marketable appearance, the owner unilaterally terminates the contract ahead of schedule. At the same time, as a rule, he is obliged to return the deposit to the tenants and compensate for the commissions that they paid to the agent when searching for housing... But the savings on repairs are still significant. And if the apartment was rented without a contract, the tenants are simply kicked out onto the street.

How to avoid becoming a victim of scammers?

Unfortunately, when the landlords themselves are scammers, tenants are very vulnerable. Potential conflicts with relatives of landlords can be prevented by carefully studying the title documents for the apartment and asking for the consent of all owners to rent.

But situations where the owner-swindler “survives” the tenants are very difficult to prove. If the agreement is formally drawn up, you can try to fight: call the police and deny accusations of rowdy behavior or damage to property, meet with the owner only by prior agreement in the presence of witnesses. The standard rental agreement states that the owner has the right to check the premises only once a month in the presence of the tenant - this gives you a reason to change the locks.

To prevent abuse on the part of the apartment owner, it is necessary to spell out as accurately as possible all the obligations of the parties in the contract: what condition is all the equipment and furniture (valued in rubles), who pays for repairs, if the cause of the breakdown is wear and tear, who has the right to be in the apartment ( guests of tenants, their relatives), whether residents are allowed to keep pets.

In addition, you can get to know your neighbors in advance or communal apartment. If the landlord has a bad reputation, they will probably be aware. And they will warn you about the endless leapfrog of residents.

But it is impossible to guarantee protection from scammers. The tenant can only minimize risks through attentiveness, experience and intuition.

What documents must be present when concluding a rental agreement?

Real estate market experts advise that you must enter into rental agreements. It's no secret that most of the rental housing market in Russia is shadow. However, this is the owner's choice. The overwhelming majority of apartments are rented semi-officially: the parties sign an agreement, but do not register it, and property owners do not report additional income to the tax authorities. However, even a simple written lease agreement is legally binding and can protect the rights of tenants. Additional guarantees - the presence of a realtor, the form and seal of the agency.

The property owner must show the tenant:

Original title documents for the apartment
Original apartment passport
Original owner's passport
A valid power of attorney for the right to rent out housing from other owners
Paid housing and communal services receipts

In addition to the contract, the tenant must have copies of title documents and the owner’s passport. In addition, the tenant should not forget about the act of acceptance and transfer of the apartment or room and the receipt for receipt of money. Each monthly payment must be recorded on paper with the signatures of the parties and the date.

Don’t be afraid to appear to a realtor or rentier as a boring reinsurer. Carefully study all the documents you sign, try to provide as many nuances as possible, and ask the real estate agent any additional questions. After all, renting a home is a service for which you pay money.

Daria Sergeeva, correspondent for GdeThisDom.RU

Realtors talk about the most common types of fraud in the rental housing market, and also give advice on how to avoid falling for scammers.

Transactions in the rental market often happen quickly. For example, a marketable apartment at an attractive price can be rented within half an hour. Market activity and the opportunity to quickly get money heat up the excitement of scammers who are finding more and more sophisticated ways to deceive respectable citizens. In such conditions, both property owners and tenants need to be as vigilant and informed as possible, realtors remind.

Tempting offers

When searching for an apartment on their own, both tenants and owners often come across “hook” advertisements. The text either indicates unprecedentedly low prices for attractive properties, or absolutely ideal tenants are vying for the apartment, real estate agents say.

Most of these advertisements are of the same type and are compiled either by private agents or small companies who are trying to somehow attract attention to themselves. The indicated rental rates are usually significantly lower than market rates - by 50-70%. "After the client calls the specified phone number, he is informed that such an attractive offer no longer exists, but there is another one." mother of pearl buttons"And at the market price. It is necessary to navigate the situation with current rental rates," says Natalya Sivko, managing director of the Miel-Arenda company.

According to the company, now the cheapest one-room apartment in Moscow can be rented for 23 thousand rubles. There are actually existing inexpensive offers, but they have a catch, and you need to be extremely careful, realtors warn. In Moscow there are offers of apartments for 20 thousand rubles per month. However, one of them is for sale, so the new owners can evict the tenant at any time. The other one can be rented only for 2 months. Or, for example, an apartment located within walking distance from Kyiv metro station can be rented for 22 thousand rubles, but with an advance payment of 12 months. In any case, offers below this price should be trusted only if good, reliable friends or relatives are renting out housing to you, notes Natalia Sivko.

Such advertisements can be called harmless tricks that only take up the client’s time and nerves. More dangerous looking frauds are schemes where a person is defrauded of money for “air”.

"News Agencies"

TO " news agencies" include SMS scammers, as well as companies that provide them with false information. The first case includes scammers who use the standard SMS fraud scheme. Persons who have posted ads on the Internet receive messages in which the scammers ask them to send a response SMS, in order to then send a database of contacts of the owners or tenants who match the request on the site, gullible citizens end up receiving nothing, and a certain amount of money is debited from their account.

The second scheme is more dangerous. Companies offer clients, for a fee, a list of contacts of owners who rent out apartments at an attractive price. The cost of the rate is indicated slightly below the market rate - by 10-15%, so as not to arouse suspicion. The client pays money (about 5 thousand rubles) and receives a list with addresses and telephone numbers of apartments. To be more convincing, they call supposedly one of the apartments from the list and agree on a showing. An unsuspecting client goes to a meeting, and no one is waiting for him there. The realtor doesn't answer calls. Calling the remaining apartments, the client understands that there are no apartments for rent in the list provided, or there are apartments, but at a completely different price. The company’s office does not accept claims, since the agency provided the “information service” in full and received remuneration for it.

"Black brokers"

You can also encounter scammers using the services of private agents. Realtors recommend using the services of private realtors only if they are advised by friends or acquaintances who have repeatedly transacted with them. Otherwise, it is difficult to trust a private realtor, since his work does not imply responsibility and financial guarantees. In addition, a private realtor will only select an apartment for you and help you conclude an agreement, however, he does not care about your further residence. If any problems arise with the owner/tenant, they will have to be resolved alone. And when concluding an agreement with a real estate agency during the period of validity of the rental agreement, you can count on the company’s assistance in solving any conflict situations, noted in "Miel-Arenda".

Fake documents

The main difficulty, according to the real estate agency, that a citizen who decides to independently rent/rent an apartment may encounter is the inability to competently study Required documents, as well as understand the clauses of the contract.

Renting an apartment using fake documents is the most common type of fraud in the rental housing market. Let us remind you that when concluding an agreement, the owner is required to present a passport and original documents for the apartment. A common trick of scammers is that the tenant is shown copies of documents, rushed and distracted while studying the documents. It is difficult to make sure that this is the real owner and that the documents for the apartment are not fake. The agent may be in collusion with the owner; the apartment is rented through dummies using forged documents, which the agent allegedly “checks.” Then the owner declares the transaction invalid, and the tenant is left without money and an apartment. In addition, in the event of fraud, housing can be subleased several times. Who will live here after this may not be decided using the most civilized methods, realtors note.

Adviсe

The basic rule that an owner or tenant needs to remember is not to pay money in advance. Payment for a realtor's services for a completed transaction always occurs after, and not before, the start of work, that is, when he has fulfilled his obligations to the client.

Monitor the price situation on the market. An attractively cheap offer is usually just a lure.

Choose your realtor or agency carefully.

During viewing of the apartment and conclusion, carefully check the documents and the lease agreement, inspect the apartment for any defects. If they show you copies, laminated property rights, explaining this with any intricacies, do not listen and do not agree.

Be sure to sign a lease agreement. Even a simple written form has legal force, implies liability and protects the rights and responsibilities of both parties.

But the delivery of the property is delayed and you are faced with the question of finding rental housing. In this article, we will try to uncover the signs of rental fraud that will help you avoid apartment scams.

Renting a home is not a simple matter and requires a serious approach. Many tenants mistakenly believe that the main difficulties in renting housing lie in finding the best suitable option. Unfortunately, this is not entirely true; searching for and renting housing involves many pitfalls. The most important of them is the risk of being deceived during the rental process. Rental fraud is quite common.

Modern practice shows that there is a high probability of being deceived by unscrupulous landlords or specialized agencies. There are often cases when a person signed a lease, made an advance payment, and a few days later simply found himself on the street. Let’s try to figure out how to avoid being scammed when renting a home, avoid becoming a victim of scammers and save your money.

It is worth noting that the actions of unscrupulous landlords or realtors, by their characteristics, can be qualified as a criminal offense, or, in other words, as fraud.

LEGAL NOTICE

Art. 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation defines fraud as the theft of someone else’s property or the illegal acquisition of rights to someone else’s property. The sanction of this article includes both significant monetary fines and imprisonment.

What should you pay attention to if you were deceived when renting an apartment?

First of all, you need to find out who is the real owner of the rental housing offered to you. To do this, you must familiarize yourself with the title documents for the apartment. Be sure to look at the house register and find out who is registered in this housing area.

IMPORTANT

When concluding a lease agreement, make sure that it is signed by the real owners. If, each of the owners must sign an agreement. Otherwise, one of them may later declare that he did not give consent to rent out the apartment, therefore did not receive money and intends to live in the said apartment himself.

An apartment rental agreement as an opportunity to prevent fraud

A properly drafted contract will help you avoid many problems and unpleasant surprises in the future. Today, almost all real estate is leased on the basis of appropriate agreements. You must understand that the more detailed and carefully all the nuances and conditions are spelled out in the contract, the more more chances prevent fraud when renting housing.

Key points included in the lease agreement:

Options real estate(square footage of living space, legal address, etc.);
General terms for concluding an agreement, the cost of rent and the procedure for making payments;
The procedure for making additional payments (payment of utilities, telephone communications, parking, etc.);
Conditions for early termination of the contract at the initiative of one of the parties.

It will be correct if everything oral agreements with the owner of the apartment you will reflect in the contract, so you will minimize the risks of being deceived when renting an apartment.

Unfortunately, deception when renting housing can be either on the part of property owners or on the part of agencies providing services in this area or individual employees agency data. You should also pay your attention to this.

Unscrupulous agencies or realtor fraud

If you decide to use the services of realtors to find and rent suitable housing, carefully study the service agreement. For example, if the contract states that the realtor or agency provides you only with information services and is not responsible for checking documents and the integrity of the landlord, you will not be able to prove that you are right and hold the party to the contract liable.

Often, to avoid responsibility, scammers resort to just such schemes. Therefore, carefully study the contract for the provision of services, especially footnotes and additions to the text of the contract written in small print.

In situations where the agreement was signed long ago, cash transferred, and you have become a victim of deception by realtors, immediately contact law enforcement agencies. It is quite possible that you are not the first person to be deceived in this way, and the police already have similar complaints.

A fairly common method of fraud is when the apartment owner takes an additional fee from tenants, promising to purchase furniture, install household appliances, make repairs, etc. Having received the money, the owner simply disappears and does not fulfill his obligations.

Never agree to additional expenses or transfer funds to the apartment owner outside the lease agreement. All your expenses must be reflected in the contract, and all your payments must be accompanied by appropriate receipts.

Sometimes it happens that the contract is concluded for a long period and prepayment is made a year in advance. However, after a few months, the owner wants to terminate the contract unilaterally. In such a situation, the owner must return the money received and pay a penalty to the tenant. It is worth noting that most often such disputes are resolved in court, which requires new costs and time.

Be sure to make sure that the lease agreement includes such concepts as conditions for early termination of the contract and penalties for improper execution obligations assumed. Remember, in order to protect yourself from fraud when renting an apartment, all oral agreements with the apartment owner must be reflected in the contract.

Average stats

We bring to your attention an average statistical review in the field of apartment rental fraud:

60% of so-called “cheap” rental apartments are involved in fraudulent schemes;
The vast majority of rental fraud cases are related to 1- and 2-room economy class apartments. First of all, this is due to increased demand in this segment of the real estate market;
The most common deception scheme is renting out an apartment to several clients at once;
More than 70% of rental fraud cases occur in big cities, Where expensive real estate generates huge demand for rental housing;
Most often, in their illegal activities, fraudsters actively take advantage of the legal illiteracy and naivety of the population.

conclusions

When dealing with the search and rental of real estate, be extremely careful and careful. Always carefully study the contract and pay attention to all the little things, this is the only way you can insure yourself against fraud when renting an apartment and save your money.

A serious attitude towards finding rental housing for the period until your apartment in a new building is rented out will save you from unpleasant surprises and negative consequences.

You shouldn’t chase cheap prices or colorful, enticing advertising. Before contacting specialized agencies or private realtors, try to find information about this agency.

Use the services of time-tested agencies with good recommendations. This way you will save not only your money, but also precious time and your nerve cells.

Nowadays, the real estate market is saturated with scammers who use various techniques to take possession of the homes of gullible citizens.

Moreover, the above applies not only to purchase or sale transactions. Rental scams are also rampant.

In this publication, the portal’s experts will tell you what types of fraud exist when renting out an apartment, how to recognize a swindler, and what to do if a tenant gets scammed when renting an apartment.

On the Internet, newspapers and on television you can find information about many methods and schemes of fraud in the rental of residential real estate.

Its authors are not only the real and imaginary owner of the apartment, but also the tenant, who then illegally disposes of the housing. For example, property is being subleased on illegal grounds.

When scammers operate, renting apartments is extremely attractive to them. After all, it is often extremely difficult for the injured party to prove the illegality of actions. This especially happens when housing is rented for a short time.

Fraud schemes when renting out apartments are also practiced by some companies calling themselves real estate agencies.

For example, a client enters into an agreement and pays a certain amount of funds. In return, he is given a set of addresses of “rental” apartments. Naturally, according to the coordinates provided, there can be no talk of any rental.

Distinctive feature of this scheme is that the contract is drawn up legally correctly. Therefore, it is almost impossible to return the money to the injured party through the court or law enforcement agencies.

Sublease initiated by a fraudster

When apartment rentals occur, scammers resort to several unscrupulous tactics.

The first of them is that housing is subleased without the knowledge of its owner. In this case, he will have to start evicting uninvited guests. And this takes a lot of time and nerves.

Another option is that the sublease agreement is concluded for a longer period than the main lease agreement. Then, sooner or later, the deceived guest will certainly face claims from the owner of the apartment.

Apartment for daily rent

Fraud in the area of apartment rentals occurs regardless of the period for which the housing is rented. When renting daily, scammers most often use the following method.

They rent a more or less decent apartment, and then place an advertisement for renting it out for a long term. Naturally, one would not envy a future employer in such a situation.

After all, literally in a matter of days the real owner of the property will come demanding to vacate the apartment. In addition, in this case, the scammers charge several months in advance and then disappear.

Fraud when renting an apartment includes the following actions. Scammers offer several apartment options for booking on the website (with minimal contact information).

After transferring a certain amount from clients, the attackers disappear and stop making contact.

Multiple rentals of apartments

This option is a classic scam in the rental market. The essence of the scheme is extremely simple. The fraudster rents an apartment and then rents it out to several different people. Naturally, a conflict arises over who should live in the housing.

It also happens that the attacker draws up contracts, takes money from citizens, and then changes all the locks on the doors. Naturally, in this case the person remains without a roof over his head and without money.

False owner

Here, too, everything is more or less clear. The person handing over the property has forged documents regarding himself or the property. He takes money several months in advance and then suddenly disappears.

Naturally, the tenant will sooner or later have to face the real owner of the property with all the ensuing consequences. At the same time, freeing up space cannot be avoided

When the apartment owner is a scammer

It is not only employers who are unscrupulous. When renting a home, fraud on the part of the owner is not excluded.

For example, he can unilaterally raise rents sharply. Practice shows that few employers try to argue with this, especially if there were no written agreements.

Here are some other types of such abuses.

Collusion between the owner and the real estate agency

The scheme is as follows. A person rents an apartment with the help of a real estate agency, paying rent and a deposit. However, after a few days, the owner suddenly insists that he needs the housing himself and asks to vacate it.

In this case, only part of the money is returned to the employer. The remaining amount is divided between the home owner and realtors.

Renting without the consent of the other owners

When an apartment has several owners, one of them may suddenly become against renting out the apartment. In this case, the citizen is forced to leave the premises and lose some of his money.

Therefore, when concluding an agreement, emphasis should be placed on the presence of other owners of the premises and their consent to move in.

Repairs at the expense of the tenant

Here the deception scheme is as follows. The owner rents out to the tenant an apartment in need of repairs. The contract stipulates a symbolic rent, but with the condition that all work must be carried out by the tenant.

As a result, the owner received the renovated premises for free, and the tenant lost a tidy sum. After all, renovating an apartment, even if inexpensive finishing materials are used, is not a cheap pleasure.

Fraud by unscrupulous real estate agencies

Many believe that renting real estate through realtors will guarantee the safety of the upcoming operation. However, in reality this is far from the case. Among real estate agencies, there are often those that use dubious schemes.

There is a lot written about such companies on the Internet and in social networks. And if the subject is apartment rentals, the types of fraud on the part of realtors are well known.

Here are just a few of them.

Databases: SMS fraud

The scheme is as follows. The client is invited to gain access to an exclusive database of apartments for rent. He is assured that options will be selected only at his request.

To gain access, scammers offer to send a paid SMS message to a specific number. Naturally, nothing happens after this.

Fictitious addresses or a pig in a poke

A popular technique used by scammers who disguise themselves as a real estate agency is the provision of so-called “information services.” The client is provided with a set of addresses of “rented” apartments for a fee.

Naturally, according to them, housing is either not for rent or has already been rented. In this case, the contract is drawn up legally correctly. Therefore, it is almost impossible for the injured party to get their money back.

Prepayment for renting an apartment

Some real estate agencies ask for prepayment for rent. This is not provided for by law. In addition, after receiving the money, the office may simply disappear.

And again Avito

Within the Russian Federation, mass goods and services are purchased through the Avito portal. Therefore, it is not surprising that fraud in renting apartments on Avito also occurs.

There are several signs that may indicate that an ad is suspicious.

Almost always a photo of an apartment is displayed that has nothing to do with reality. As a rule, the image is taken from numerous third-party resources.
The advertisement contains prices that are significantly lower than market prices. Fraudsters do this specifically in order to select more potential victims.

When scammers work on Avito, renting apartments may involve making an advance payment for rent, which is then easily cashed out by the scammers.

Criminals also offer their services for remote housing search. For this purpose, a monthly subscription fee. And it is far from a fact that the desired option will be selected.

Selling a rented apartment using fake documents

This scheme is quite common in the Russian Federation. Its essence is as follows.

First, suitable housing is rented. To do this, the owner of the apartment is presented with a false passport. Alternatively, the lease agreement is issued to a third party.

In the described situation, both the original owner and the purchaser of the apartment suffer. And if the owner often manages to return his property after a number of trials and criminal proceedings, then the deceived buyer is left with nothing, namely without money and housing.

Short term rental

We said above that if apartments are rented on a daily basis, the fraud mainly consists of providing housing in a chain for a longer period.

In addition, the apartment can be subleased by scammers to several persons at once. After which the attackers with the money disappear.

Memo to a potential tenant: how to avoid fraud when renting an apartment

We found out what are the tricks and types of scams when renting housing. To avoid becoming a victim of an attacker, experts provide several simple recommendations. Following them allows you to protect yourself from serious problems.

When you are renting an apartment, a lawyer can tell you how to avoid falling for scammers during your consultation. However, our advice will also be useful.

The contract is a guarantee of security

All relations between the apartment owner and the future tenant should be formalized in writing. It is definitely worth providing a description of the apartment and the details of the title documents for it.

The agreement specifies the amount of rent, the procedure for compensation of repair costs and utilities. It is imperative to specify the conditions under which the tenant can be evicted from the apartment ahead of schedule.

Specify the composition of the property

Fraud by the owner may involve demanding that the tenant compensate for damages for the theft of an item that was not actually in the apartment. Therefore, an inventory of furniture and household appliances, as well as other things, if they are in the apartment.

This inventory should be verified at the time of termination of the contract. This way the tenant will protect himself from one of the types of fraud.

What documents to check and what to pay attention to?

First of all, you should study the passport of the apartment owner. The photograph pasted into it must correspond to the citizen’s real appearance.

You should also check all title documents for the apartment (extract from the real estate register, privatization agreement, etc.). It would be useful to look at the technical or cadastral passport.

If the apartment has several owners (and this can be seen from the title documents), then ask for their consent to provide housing for rent.

How to check a person

If in doubt

If you doubt the reliability of the upcoming operation, then it is better not to sign the contract. After all, you can lose not only your funds. As we have already said, the actions of intruders can lead to the loss of an apartment.

What to do if you were deceived?

In any case, the appeal must contain the circumstances of the fraud, as well as its external manifestations. If the identity of the attacker is known exactly, then you should indicate it (but do not forget about false denunciation).

When the victim is harmed material damage, its size is written. You can also write about moral harm. The application must have a personal signature, otherwise it will not be considered.

If the result of fraud is the loss of property, then a lawsuit is filed to declare one or more transactions on the alienation of property invalid. It is best to do this when the fact of fraud is established by the investigation and the court.

What actions need to be taken, where to go, how to record and what papers to collect if fraud has been committed against the tenant/tenant?

The hero of “The Golden Calf” O. Bender knew 400 relatively honest ways of taking money. Today's realities allow fraudsters to significantly diversify the ways they commit fraud. It is hardly possible to name them all, as well as to develop a single universal way to combat them. However, before you decide to rent or rent out an apartment, you need to present the main ones.

Fraud of news agencies. The person who called about the rental ad is asked to come to the office “to make an advance payment.” Fraudsters usually post ads with good apartments at very low prices. In the office, specially trained people offer the client many excellent options for rental housing, while their prices are significantly lower than market prices, and agent services are quite inexpensive. The tenant, who wants to rent a house cheaply and pay less commission, agrees. He enters into an “exclusive agreement,” makes an advance payment and goes to inspect the options. The contract states that the agency provides “information services,” but the client does not pay attention to this detail. It soon turns out that there is no housing for rent at the addresses given to him by the agency. Outraged by this, he returns to the office, but the “agents” are no longer so friendly and courteous. He is told that the contract is valid for a month and he can explore other options. However, all subsequent home viewings will be “single”. When the contract expires, the client will be told that the agency has fulfilled its obligations to him.

In such a situation, it is almost impossible to get your money back. From the point of view of the law, the contract was drawn up correctly: the agency provided “information services”, the client paid for them. A deceived client is simply no longer allowed into the office. To avoid becoming a victim of fraud, you should remember that you should never transfer an advance payment without first inspecting the apartment and completing the paperwork.

Illegal rental. A typical situation is when enterprising citizens provide a potential employer with documents for an apartment (as a rule, not the originals), show the apartment, accept an advance payment, a security deposit, a commission (in the end a decent amount is obtained) and disappear. Or they give you the opportunity to move into the apartment and disappear, and after a short time it turns out that the tenant has no legal grounds to be in this apartment.

A similar method of fraud is subletting an apartment without the consent of the landlord. For example, the owner has rented out an apartment, the payment is transferred to his bank card and he calmly goes on a trip (a cult scenario), while in fact no one is monitoring the apartment. After some time, people who start living in the apartment are completely different from those to whom the owner rented the apartment. Obviously, by filing a lawsuit to evict uninvited guests, the landlord will restore his rights (in particular the right to own the apartment), but this will require time, money for legal expenses and a strong supply of nerves.

In practice, there are cases when tenants stop paying and, threatening the property owner in every possible way, continue to live peacefully in the apartment. A reflexive attempt by the landlord to contact the police may not always end in success. If the threats are not recorded, for example, on the phone or cannot be confirmed by witnesses, the police will not be able to respond in any way, since the parties have concluded a rental agreement and all issues of its execution must be resolved through civil proceedings.

Finally, the biggest method of fraud is sale of a rented apartment using fake documents. The apartment is rented using a fake passport or on behalf of a person whom the tenant has never actually seen. Within a couple of months, they prepare documents, arrange showings of the apartment, make a deal and the money disappears. With a probability close to 100%, the tenant will be able to regain the apartment by initiating a criminal case, a long investigation, parallel or sequential trial. As a result, the buyer will be left with direct damage. However, a lot of time, effort, money, and nerves will be spent on such a struggle.

How to avoid falling for scammers' tricks?

In practice, the truth of the proverb has long been proven: “The miser pays twice.” If you want to rent/rent an apartment, but you don’t have the option of making a deal with friends you trust, don’t save money, contact professional realtors with a good reputation, reviews, a large database and various options.

Never leave/give away the original documents for the apartment and your passport for a long period of time. Presenting it for review is no problem, leaving it “for verification” is never a question. There is enough data for verification, that is, just photocopies.

What documents should I check?

When concluding a rental agreement for residential premises, do not be lazy and require the landlord to provide the following documents: a certificate of ownership of the residential premises (another document allowing you to rent out an apartment - a certificate of inheritance, deed of gift, contract social hiring etc.), cadastral passport (technical passport BTI), extract from personal account (information about supplied utilities), an extract from the house register. Check the details of the apartment owner through the free online services of the government services portal or Rosreestr. It doesn't take much time, but it helps to avoid trouble.

The landlord should check with the potential employer not only the passport, but also at least one other document - driver's, service, pension, tax identification number or student ID, etc., and inquire about the place of work/study or other purpose of the visit to the region of temporary residence. In the end, it wouldn’t hurt to “Google” the person, that is, look for information about him on the Internet and social networks. Quite often, to counteract specific scammers, entire forums are created where they “know the enemy by sight” and offer specific countermeasures.

Enter into a well-drafted, detailed employment agreement, which in one way or another reflects all the conditions that are important to you.

Drawing up a security deposit agreement or requiring the counterparty to carry property and liability insurance can also help avoid trouble.

These simple tips are not a panacea for scammers, but they significantly reduce the risk of becoming their victims.

Apartments for rent

Be careful when transferring prepayments to new site users. For additional security, we recommend that you first request documents for the object and confirmation of the transaction.

Concluding contracts for the selection of real estate on behalf of CIAN

Advertisements on the CIAN website can be viewed for free; they are posted in free access. Do not trust those who introduce themselves as a “branch” of CIAN and offer to make a selection of objects for an additional fee. Do not enter into a contract before viewing the property and checking the documents for the property.