Imagine that you are looking for a place to rent in a new city. Since you aren’t familiar with the area, you use Craigslist to find the perfect place with an affordable rent.  Unable to reach the landlord in person, you wire your deposit and first month’s rent in exchange for the keys to the residence.

Then you discover the crushing truth. The keys don’t work. In fact, the property is not even available. You’ve been scammed out of your money.

Unfortunately, this scheme is becoming common place on Craigslist and other classifieds sites. A Texas woman lost her $900 deposit on a house when her scammer gave her fake keys to a house he didn’t own. A Kansas family almost lost out on $1400, but avoided their loss with further investigation. What they found was that the house they were looking to rent, was not owned by the woman in Africa with whom they had been corresponding via email.

This type of scam starts with the criminal lifting the address and photos of a property that is for sale, and posting it as a vacant rental online. The scammer then lures an interested party in, weaving a believable story about why they are not in town to meet and show the property in person. Then, after the innocent renter wires money to the person, the renter either receives fake keys or no keys at all, and the scammer has disappeared with their money into Internet oblivion.

Here at Safelist, we are aware of the scams that plague Internet users and we are committed to providing a safer alternative to help minimize the chances that this could happen to you.

We realize that the anonymity of online classifieds allows criminals greater ability to disappear once they commit fraud. Therefore, we have created a community of only verified users.  Each Safelist member must verify their identity, ensuring that the person with whom you are transacting, is who they say they are. Therefore, should any crime be committed while using Safelist, we will have that offender’s personal information, thus making the criminals accountable for their actions.

Our hope is that identity verification alone will deter criminal activity; however, should a crime be committed, Safelist will be ready to assist in the apprehension of the perpetrators involved.

We invite you to join our safer community, where our members can engage in online commerce free from worry and suspicion.