BEAUFORT COUNTY, S.C. (WSAV) – A consumer alert for Lowcountry home buyers or those looking to buy a lot from an online seller.
It could be a scam.
It is a scheme that’s happened multiple times recently in the Lowcountry and realtors want to warn everyone before they get taken for all their cash.
“The last realtor said the person had called and said his wife was sick and his heart got there and he said, ‘I want to help this person,’” explained Jean Beck, CEO of the HH Area Association of Realtors.
Beck says it turned out that person was a scam artist trying to sell a piece of property that they didn’t own.
They were using one of a half dozen online “sale by owner” sites to make it happen.
“Scammers had come in, put it on a website where they have for sale by owners considerably under market price and were looking for a quick sale,” said Beck.
“There’s usually a story behind them,” she continued. “There’s usually something like someone in my family is sick or there’s a family emergency. There’s some reason they can no longer build and they want to move the property quickly off the market.”
In this case, the buyer noticed some red flags before the scam artist could cash in.
“One of the red flags that realtors notice is they are not engaged in a regular transaction like someone who is selling. They are not always…
