[5]
By Oregon Taxpayers Foundation,
Where there’s money to be made, scammers are likely to jump in—and that’s just what they’re doing in the hot Portland rental market. According to KPTV [6], they copy information from real estate listings where owners are selling their homes and then post it on Craigslist offering to rent it cheap. Sometimes they encourage would-be renters to view the home during open houses held by real estate agents. Even if they’re unable to actually rent the homes, they’ve collected personal and financial information from potential renters. One Portland real estate broker told KPTV about 80 percent of his listings are posted on Craigslist as fake low-cost rentals.