Local Profile reported in October that rent prices in the DFW area are not slowing down as much as the national average. With evictions in North Texas on the rise, for renters who’ve also had to add inflation to the equation, this has been a rough year and people are looking for cheaper places to live. But desperate times also open the doors to scammers trying to take advantage of people’s despair.
According to CBSDFW, the Davila family from McKinney was looking to move their 9-month-old baby away from the mold that was forming inside their rented apartment and they began searching online for a better place to live. When they found a two-story house only a few miles away available on the online real estate marketplace Zillow, they immediately got in contact with the owner.
“We moved so quickly because we were so excited this home just seemed like a perfect home for our family,” Breanna Davila told CBSDFW.
Davila set up a tour of the house through a phone call with the owner who guided her into using the door lock box to get inside. “I got the code, I unlock the lock box, I got the key, I looked at the home, I fell in love with the home, I offered to pay upfront and then he asked me to pay him via Zelle,” she continued.
Once the Davilas had transferred a total of $4,000, the family moved to what they thought was their new home. Only four days later, a representative from FirstKey Homes, a rental company based in Georgia, showed up to their…
