David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images
- Jamey and Lauren Bertram's house, worth over $1 million, was posted on Zillow without their consent.
- A scammer listed the house for just $10,000, asking interested buyers to wire $200 to secure a tour.
- Some scammers can target eager buyers in a housing market with few reasonably priced homes for sale.
Picture waking up one day to find your inbox flooded and doorbell ringing with eager buyers all clamoring to purchase your home.
In this sluggish real estate market, it might seem like a dream — that is, if you're actually looking to sell.
For Kansas City homeowners Jamey and Lauren Bertram, the situation turned into a nightmarish ordeal when they realized their 5,300-square-foot home, purchased for around $1 million in 2019, had been falsely listed for sale on Zillow for a mere $10,000.
The Kansas City Star first reported the mixup.
"My wife and I both started getting emails from our friends saying, 'Hey, are you selling your house?' Of course, we're not," Bertram, who LinkedIn says is senior vice president at architecture and engineering firm Burns and McDonnell, told the newspaper. "I didn't know what they were talking about."
According to the Star, when Bertram first saw his home posted on Zillow, featuring images from the 2019 listing, it was for sale at its market value. However, within a few days, the price had been slashed to a fraction of its true worth: $10,000.
The Star quoted the listing description that Bertrams presumed was written by a scammer: "Once a year we sell one or a few of our homes to first time buyers for under $25,000. This is done to bless a family or individual that needs it, but also as a tax write off for us."
The listing description said that real-estate agents, lenders, investors, wholesalers, and attorneys should not inquire further, according to the Kansas City Star. It directed interested buyers to contact an individual named Mandi at a phone number with a Las Vegas area code.
The newspaper said when it tried reaching out to Mandi, it received a response instructing potential buyers to send $200 via an online banking app to the "owner's mom." It claimed a walk-through of the house would be provided, and a refund would be issued to anyone who didn't end up making an offer.
The listing was removed last week, but it wasn't clear how long it was live. Requests for comment to the Bertrams by phone and email was not immediately returned.
These scams are relatively common
Despite their brazenness, real-estate scams are pretty routine.
In 2023, the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Internet Crime Complaint Center saw more than 880,000 complaints about internet scams totaling $12.5 billion in losses. That's a 49% increase in the amount of money reported lost in 2022, according to FBI data that BI's Jordan Pandy cited in March.
Real estate scams are an especially popular internet crime.
According to the FBI, real estate wire fraud is classified as business email compromise (BEC). In the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center's annual report, BEC ranked as the second-costliest crime in 2022, following investment fraud, with reported losses totaling $2.9 billion.
Data from the Federal Bureau of Investigation shows that in 2023, over 9,500 people from across the country filed complaints of real estate fraud.
Homebuyers are easy prey for scammers right now.
In a housing market burdened by high prices and few available homes, many prospective buyers are eager to secure a good deal. Scammers, motivated by the potential to earn hundreds or even thousands of dollars, can turn to real-estate marketplaces like Zillow. Taking advantage of anonymity, they can create listings with appealing descriptions and unrealistically low prices to lure unsuspecting buyers.
In November, Galen Caldwell told news station KIRO 7 that his million-dollar Seattle home had been listed for sale on Zillow without his consent, priced at $10,245. The incident was connected to the Bertrams' situation by CBS News. In Caldwell's case, too, a scammer told prospective buyers to contact "Mandi" in Las Vegas and send $245 to the seller's mother.
Both Caldwell's and the Bertrams' listings have since been taken down.
But Bertram said that he and his wife are still receiving inquiries from people who want to buy their home.
"I'm kind of stuck here," Bertram told the Kansas City Star. "People want to see the house. It's just a complete scam."