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When you are renting for a short visit you are most likely going to be renting blind, going off an internet description. Scammers take advantage of this and sadly every week a new visitor to London turns up to find that the property that they have paid for doesn’t exist.

Only the other week I received this question:

I am looking to book a holiday apartment for 9 days during August
I have found a selection of lovely apartments within our budget and just wanted some feedback seeing as the landlord/agent who we are dealing with has stated no viewings are available and they ask for 75% of total rent/deposit to be paid up front.Here is the website

http://unitrusthomeservices.com/

They advertise most of them on Gumtree also but this is the place to handle the booking.

My answer was as follows:

Scam Property is always a steal of a bargain, genuine property just cannot compete on price. This Studio is an absolute bargain. To give you an indication the market leader for serviced Studios in Central London is Dolphin Square who charge £185/night. We compete with them by offering a similar product at half the price – which is in itself an absolute bargain. This studio is in one of the most exclusive addresses there is and is offered at 1/3rd of our price, or 1/6th of the going rate. That screams scam, before you even look hard.

The website looks very genuine, & most impressive. However the phone number is not a landline number but an 070 number forwarding service, and the website domain was registered less than a month ago (5th July).

Personally my interest would end at this point. But you might like to dig further, especially if they are prepared to take payment by some protected service such as Credit Card.

The website was registered by:

Abraham Isaac
31 Queen Anne Street Marylebone
London, London W1G 9DL

There is actually a Doctor’s surgery at that address:

Leonard M Selby
31 Queen Anne Street
Marylebone
London
W1G 9HT

Tel: 020-7636-5250
Business Type: Doctors (General Practitioners)

Sorry to spoil your holiday.

Sadly the message was followed soon after by another reply as follows:

Sorry I have to say that this “unitrusthomeservices” has tricked us.

The past Tuesday we arrived london from Madrid (Spain). We had seen this fantastic flat on Gumtree and it liked us. We booked it for three weeks and they asked us to make the reservation with a money transfer to an account from Halifax, it was 560 pounds. Well, we arrived london and tried to contact the person that e-mail us from unitrust. No answer. We tried with the number in the website and nothing. We have gone to the police station for two days and they have said we should go to the Citizens Advice Bureau, anyway they have taken the address and the name of the person from unitrusthomeservices.
After three days walking about Police Station, hotels and agencies of lettings we have actually rent a room on a shared flat and can be relaxed.

So if you are thinking of renting a London Flat from abroad bear in mind the following points:

Scam Properties are a Bargain. If it seems too good to be true – it is.

Only deal with established businesses. Check out the address. Only deal with a working Landline Number, if there is only a mobile or number forwarding phone number move on.

If it’s a business it won’t be advertising using free ads on Gumtree, Craigslist, et al

Only pay by a reversible method (Credit Card, Paypal).