The advertisement on Craigslist sounded too good to be true – a house for rent near Interstate 540 in Raleigh for $600 a month, including utilities. For interested renters, there was a catch – the owner of the house didn’t post that ad.
Owner Sharon Evans posted her house on another rental property website and first heard about the Craigslist ad from a WRAL News reporter. This was the first time someone had hijacked her house ad and posted it as their own, Evans said, but as a real estate agent she has seen it happen many times with homes she is helping to sell.
“They would scrape those (house) pictures and then put it up for rent for half of what it normally would rent if it were actually for rent,” Evans said.
