You’d be sickened.
Austrian students Marie Sramek and Tanya Rosenecker were looking for a place to rent in Dublin late last month and things went badly wrong.
The two girls found a nice place in south Dublin city on Facebook and contacted the landlord to try and secure the accommodation.
According to the Irish Times, they emailed the alleged owner, whose name was Athika Khalid, and came to an agreement for the terraced house.
A few more mails were sent back and forth with more details and the girls put a deposit of €550 into the landlord’s bank account.
That was all grand until they turned up to the address of the house, the people living there said they’d never heard of someone called Athika Khalid.
You might think the girls were naive sending on the deposit but Khalid sent them a copy of her passport, a UPC bill, the details of an AIB account based in Drogheda. It was all fake.
There is a bit of a silver lining to the story because the woman living beside the house they thought they were going to rent has taken them in.
Breda Kennedy helped the girls just after the incident by bringing them in for tea and taking them to Kevin Street Garda Station.
She’s now given them her spare room while they get back on their feet and get accommodation elsewhere. A kind gesture.
The guards say similar scams have been taking place in the UK and their advice is to stick to reputable websites and always view the property before handing over money.
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