Spanish scam??

[roxytoo]

I have had a coule of emails in from a spanish guy but not sure if its a scam or not!! Is there anyone here who can speak fluent spanish? I have done my best translating but still not sure, we are off to Spain ourselves tomorrow for a week and he wants it from 2nd April, wants to pay me in amercian dollars into my bank account here is his first email sent
hola, mi nombre es Hector Di Luca, vivo en Estados Unidos y pronto estare viviendo en Valencia. Estoy interesado en el alquiler de su vivienda por un o dos semanas. Me gustaria ponerme en contacto con ud. Muchas gracias de antemano. Hector

[Alan Knighting]

Meishka,

Ask yourself, is it likely that someone who lives in the USA but is moving to Valencia wants to have a couple of weeks in Torrevieja. Would he not be more likely to look at Sagunto, Burriana, Benecassim, Cullera, Gandia, Oliva, etc. Torrevieja?

Maybe it's real but maybe it's not!

Alan

[vrooje]

I agree with Alan -- it's not *so* full of detail that it's incredibly suspicious, but it could be a scam as well.

Does anyone else think we should have a single forum thread for posting potential scam e-mails?

Maybe I'll start one in the "Handling Rental Enquiries" thread.

[roxytoo]

turns out Hector is real!!! I must be getting paranoid but then have had 3 scams in the last few days!! Isn't it always the way, just before I'm ready to leave I get flooded with enquiries??

Will miss you all, be back in a week!!

[vrooje]

Have a good time!

One day when I was on vacation (a week or so ago), I got three separate inquiries within 15 minutes of one another! I also got an e-mail from an editor of a magazine for affluent citizens of the southern USA, and they want to devote a page to our town and our property!

I'm so glad I set up my e-mail to send my cell phone text messages upon receipt of inquiries.

[paolo]

Does anyone else think we should have a single forum thread for posting potential scam e-mails?

Maybe I'll start one in the "Handling Rental Enquiries" thread.

Good idea, I beat you to it.

[vrooje]

And improved upon the idea, I see! Love it.

[jimadept]

Unless there's an obvious sc@m element, such as "I will send you a cheque for 3 times the rent and you send the balance back to my wife by Western Union before the cheque clears", surely the normal booking deposit is enough to sort out the genuine customer from the fraudulent? Payment of 25% - 50% within say 3 weeks or the booking lapses. Period.

Seems to me like some of the posters here are being overly paranoid and could be missing out on genuine bookings as a result.This poor Spanish chap's only crime is giving too many details in his enquiry!

Jim

[paolo]

Seems to me like some of the posters here are being overly paranoid and could be missing out on genuine bookings as a result.

But if you allow three weeks for a scammer to send a deposit that never comes, you may be turning away genuine enquiries during that time. There is a nuisance element to these scams.

My advice is if you are in doubt, ask here. Inevitably some genuine enquiries will be put in doubt, but a genuine enquiry soon resolves itself - you'll get a deposit payment for the correct amount and no immediate request to send a Western Union payment to somewhere in Africa.

[vrooje]

Jim,

You're probably right -- but then again, better safe than sorry! Intuition that something is not quite right is more often correct than incorrect, so it pays to listen to it.

Frankly, I'm a teeny bit suspicious of anyone who sends a check. Not nearly enough that I'd turn them away just for it, but it makes me more aware of everything they've said/done. Nowadays nearly everyone has a credit card and you don't even need a PayPal account to send a deposit, so there's very little reason not to. There are even advantages -- if you send a payment for something over PayPal and the seller turns out to be a fraud, you can usually get your money back. Not so with a check! Whenever anyone refuses to use a credit card it always makes me wonder just a little.

[jimadept]

Re credit cards, an awful lot of people are extremely wary about using their credit cards online, and who can blame them?

There are downsides and upsides for us as well: the big upside is that it can be done quickly, so you don't have the 3-week wait for the cheque to arrive, nor the second wait for it to clear. Of course the downside is that fraudulent buyers can also request refunds from their cc company.

At the end of the day you have to assume that people are bona fide until proven otherwise.

One way of protecting yourself is by ensuring that your property is rented out long in advance, then you can be sure that the deposits are sitting safely in your bank account long before the guest is due to arrive. Not always possible of course, but it makes it worthwhile maximising your advertising exposure.

Jim

[Alan Knighting]

I am posting this here because it came from yahoo.es in other words, from Spain. It arrived this afternoon.

Hello
Am Mrs ??????? me and my family will like to know how you run this rentel,well are on a vacation for this year (Nov 1 2005 and checking out April 31st 2006) and we are as well willing to buy a small house around that area that your house is located,well we are referring to that will wanted to rent your aprt that you have for rent on a monthly rentel or weekly rentel we are planning staying i mean we wanted to buy a small house in that area but before then we wanted to stay for 6 months or 6 weeks rentel we only wants to stay around and check the security area before i buy the house that i intends to buy in that area ok,so i will be very glad to have the amount for the monthly rentel and if you do notrun monthly rentel we are as well ok by weekly rentel,i will be very glad to tell you that we are much interested in renting yourhome,well will like to have all info that you think real tenetwill n! eeded to know about,well we will be starting the rentel by sep 2005 till march 2005 and as well while we stay in the aprtwe will be making uses of things like bike and some otherassecories i hope that is Ok.i have 2 kids and one wife and me allmaking 4 in number,i will needs to know more about the house you have for rent,any way i will be willing to hear from you sonner ok.
Thanks Alot.

At the moment I am in two minds whether or not it is spam. My strong suspicion is that it is spam. I am inclined to send a simple response just to see what comes back but, before I do, has anyone received the same enquiry?
Regards

Alan

[Alan Knighting]

Fluffy is underwhelmed by the response so far.

[vrooje]

In a way, that could be a good sign? I haven't received this.

Is this person supposed to be a native English speaker? I agree, this looks suspicious to me. But I might still follow up until the enormous cashier's check is offered.

[paolo]

This is a scam. First sentence: 'Am Mrs...' Has anyone ever received a genuine enquiry that starts like this, even in good English?

If she is a Mrs, how come she has a wife?

Apart from that, the general gibberishness is either a smokescreen or the work of a lunatic, and you don't want that for 7 months.