My partner and I were looking for a new apartment in a new city. We were using immowelt and immobilienscout. I am new to immowelt and thus am not familiar with the system. I got this email yesterday to my private email (not mentioning from immowelt/immobilienscout), and recognized some red flags (owner is not in germany, asking for another person’s details, asking for speaking in english). The apartment and the rent are really a dream for us. We just want to know if maybe someone can also point the red flags. I know the only way is to reply the email and get in touch with the owner. But well ..

TIA

by Jee-Day

26 comments

  1. !housing

    Read the wiki. Your points are valid, but maybe it’s not a scam. Just don’t transfer any money before you have the keys and can move in.

  2. > The apartment and the rent are really a dream for us.

    That is also a red flag. “Too good to be true” usually is just that. Mixed with all the other ones you’ve correctly identified, this is IMO clearly a scam.

  5. 95qm – 700€ – in a city – owner not in germany – overly friendly email. Quite a lot of red flags. Might be not a scam tho. Dont transfer any money before youve seen the flat with your own eyes.

  6. Where’s the flat located? 700€ including utilities and fully furnished for 95m² is not realistic, even in low-demand areas. Easiest solution: ask them for an in-person viewing, either with them or whoever is in charge of the flat as long as they are abroad. And they will NEED someone in charge, you can’t do all the legal tasks of renting a flat via zoom. If they are “so so sorry, our dog has asthma and we can only come to Germany after your move-in date” you have solid proof for scammers.

  8. **100% Scam**

    You just need to put “wir sind forschungsingenieure” in Google to find out that a common scam.

    [https://www.abendzeitung-muenchen.de/muenchen/neue-betrugsmasche-in-muenchen-trifft-vor-allem-verzweifelte-wohnungssuchende-art-934985](https://www.abendzeitung-muenchen.de/muenchen/neue-betrugsmasche-in-muenchen-trifft-vor-allem-verzweifelte-wohnungssuchende-art-934985)

    [https://www.ruhrnachrichten.de/dortmund/augen-auf-beim-wohnungskauf-in-dortmund-polizei-warnt-vor-phishing-auf-immobilienportalen-w810619-2001009829/](https://www.ruhrnachrichten.de/dortmund/augen-auf-beim-wohnungskauf-in-dortmund-polizei-warnt-vor-phishing-auf-immobilienportalen-w810619-2001009829/)

    [https://www.betrugsalarm.com/scam/view/700838](https://www.betrugsalarm.com/scam/view/700838)

    [https://www.reddit.com/r/wohnen/comments/1623jxy/ist_das_ein_fake_wenn_ja_was_wollen_die_von_uns/](https://www.reddit.com/r/wohnen/comments/1623jxy/ist_das_ein_fake_wenn_ja_was_wollen_die_von_uns/)

  9. Next thing they will probably offer to send you the apartment key from England via mail after you pay the deposit. Scam!

  10. Yeah it’s 100% a scam, it’ll be nice and dandy until they demand a fee to send you the keys and then vanish into thin air never to be seen again.

  11. Scam. Old trick. Don‘t invest any more energy. These people don‘t exist, the Apartment doesn’t exist

  12. It’s a scam. Any kind of bullshit life story and not being present or represented by an official Makler is 100% a scam.

    Also the weird formal deepl translation makes it obvious.

    No one writes like that but scammers 

  15. Maybe Berlin in Klein-Bennebeck, Schleswig-Holstein. Klein Bennebeck also has a “Potsdam” and a “Bellevue”, quite amazing at 524 inhabitants total.

  16. SCAM 👹🚨🚨

    If you also ask them to have a online Interview, they gonna give you thousands excuse that we can’t do that.

  17. Scam. No German landlord tells you his hobbies or job, because it does not matter. No one cares about it but Americans that love this kind of chitchat small talk.

    And yes, just browse this sub-redditr, exactly this letter gets posted here every other day.

  18. 100% a scam.

    Also ran across this almost verbatim while looking for a place in a new city, but they were trying to sell the apartment, not rent it. I caught on after the first email, in which they gave a ton of irrelevant details about their kids, and that they’d be using a real estate company in London. It didn’t smell right from the start, so I used a throwaway email to contact them.

    >Email from scammer #1
     vielen Dank für Ihr Interesse und schön, Sie kennenzulernen.
     Mein Name ist Laura und ich besitze die Immobilie in **~[address removed]~**.
     Ich habe zusammen mit meinem Mann einen Verkaufspreis von **~140.000,00 €~** festgelegt.
     Ein paar Details über uns, wir sind Forschungsingenieure, die Immobilie wurde vor einigen Jahren während der Arbeit in Deutschland gekauft, es ist voll bezahlt und es bestehen keine Schulden oder Hypotheken.
     Seit ungefähr einem Jahr sind wir mit unserer Arbeit in Großbritannien umgezogen und brauchen die Immobilie nicht mehr.
     Wenn Sie immer noch interessiert sind, bitte kontaktieren Sie mich um Ihnen weitere Informationen darüber zu geben, Besuch planen, etc.  ~Sprechen Sie Englisch? Es wäre einfacher für mich.~

    >Email from scammer #2
    The property is available for sale, our family felt very good there, the neighborhood is friendly, nice people, quiet, a good place to live.. As I’ve told you in my previous email, I am the only owner of the property and it was purchased with my own funds (not financed by the bank) a few years ago while I worked in Germany.  For approximately one year, I have moved abroad to the United Kingdom with my entire family. I no longer need the mentioned property, both my children are in school here, most likely I will return to Germany only on holiday.    Because I do not have plenty of time to deal with selling this property, visits with potential clients etc, I have decided together with my husband to hire an international real estate agency that will manage the entire purchase and sale process of the property.
     I have already signed an exclusivity contract with them, as this is the second property to be sold with their assistance. All the documents in original along with the keys of the property are in their custody at the headquarters of the agency here in London.
     The commission of the agency is entirely paid by us and you will only pay for the notary documents, in case you agree on purchasing the property after visiting it, of course.

     If you are interested in establishing a viewing to the property, I need the following information from you:  

    > Full Name: ………………….

    > Full Address: ………………….

    > Email: ………………….

    > Mobile Number: …………………. 

    > After receiving your details, my agent will let you know the schedule when the viewings are made and also all the details needed, photos and plans of the property etc.
     I am waiting for your response, sorry if sometimes I am responding quite late on the emails, my schedule is full with my work, children.. 

    I never responded to the second email because it was waving enough red flags that it could be confused with the USSR. Certainly the English in the second email doesn’t sound natural. It’s almost right, but as English is my native language, there’s a few points that make it not sound like it was written by a person who is ESL.

    In the end I’m still not sure what they were hoping to get out of the scam, unless they hope to try to get you to wire “ernest money” to hold the property while you’re dealing with the notary. Otherwise I can only think that they’re trying to get your info so they can target you with other scams or something, since there’s no obvious hook like a transfer of Kaution.

  19. Well so a couple of thoughts

    To begin with it’s obvious to me that somebody wrote this and didn’t do it with google translate. The German is very high level but still has like a few small mistakes that I can’t explain with google translate.

    But then they say English is easier for them. Knowing English speakers, if they learn it to that high of a level they aren’t gonna write this almost perfect email but still prefer to speak English, it’s weird. English speakers that learn c1 German are rare and those that do are rightfully quite proud of themselves and wouldn’t diminish their own language skills like this.

    Daher scam

  20. Also red flag: they tell you they’re looking for someone responsible who will take care of the apartment as if it were theirs. (They’re hooking you by indirectly implying this is *you*)

    Any landlord in general hopes you don’t f*ck up the property, but they never have to say this directly because it should more or less be a given when you rent

  21. Sorry for you, but it is 100% scam/fraud.

    Next thing they will ask for is a deposit for sending the keys.

    Delete it 😒

  23. Definitly scam. No one in germany who is searching for tenants is this kind to strangers.

  24. We received literally the same e-mail, just in Switzerland 😂😂

  25. Reverse imagine searching often helps proving it’s scam

  26. I swear I had the same scam 8 months ago. Literally same email copy paste and I found it on ImmoScout24.

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