In 2022 I was looking for my second apartment in Austin and I almost sent $500 to someone I had never met for an apartment I had never seen. The listing looked real. The person sounded normal. Everything felt fine until one small thing did not add up. That one thing saved me $500 and a lot of stress. This post is about what I saw, what felt off, and how you can spot a fake listing before it costs you real money.
“The place just went back on the market. Two other people are looking at it today. If you want to hold it, I need a deposit by tonight.”
That was the message I got in 2022 when I was searching for a new apartment in Austin. I had just finished my first year at my East Sixth Street place and was looking around to see what else was out there. The market that year was wild. Rents were going up fast and good apartments were getting taken in days, sometimes hours. So when someone said two other people were already looking, my first feeling was panic. Not suspicion. Panic.
That panic is exactly what scammers want you to feel.
What the Listing Looked Like
I found it on Facebook Marketplace. The photos were great. A one-bedroom near South Congress, nice wood floors, big windows, in-unit washer and dryer. The rent was $1,150 a month, which even in early 2022 was on the lower side for that area but not so low that it felt impossible.
The person who posted it said they were the owner, not a property company. They said they had just moved out of state for work and were handling everything remotely. They were friendly and wrote in full sentences. No strange spelling. No weird grammar.
I asked to see the place. They said they could not be there in person but they would mail me the keys after I paid a holding deposit of $500. Once I got the keys, I could go look at it myself and if I did not like it, they would give me my money back.
That part felt a little odd but I almost talked myself into it. It was 2022. Austin was insane. Maybe this was just how things worked now when owners were out of state.
I did not send the money. But I came very close.
The Thing That Stopped Me
I copied the address from the listing and searched it on Google Maps. The building was real. It existed. Then I went to the Travis County Appraisal District website, which is a free public site where you can look up who actually owns any property in Austin, and I searched that address.
The name that came up as the owner was completely different from the name of the person messaging me.
That was it. That was the thing. The person claiming to own the apartment did not own it. Someone else did. The real owner had no idea their property photos were being used to run a scam.
If I had not checked that one thing, I would have sent $500 to a stranger for a place that was never available and never theirs to rent.
If you are looking for your first place and want to understand all the real costs that come with signing a lease, I wrote about those in my post on what to know about rental costs before moving to Austin. Knowing what real numbers look like also helps you spot when something is priced in a way that seems too good.
Why 2022 Made It Worse
The Austin rental market in 2022 was not like normal years. If you want to see just how much prices jumped, I put together a comparison of Austin rent costs in 2026 vs 2022 that shows how wild that period really was.
When the market is hot and places are going fast, scammers get smarter about using urgency. They do not need to trick you into believing a crazy story. They just need to make you feel like you will lose the apartment if you do not act right now. In a market where that actually was true for real listings, the fake ones blended in perfectly.
The pressure of a hot market makes people skip steps they would normally take. They stop checking things. They stop asking questions. They just try not to lose the place.
The Most Common Scam Shapes I Saw That Year
After the close call, I started paying attention to patterns. I saw a lot of listings that year and the fake ones tended to follow the same shape.
The owner is always out of town. Out of state, out of the country, on a work trip. There is always a reason they cannot meet you or let you in. The reason sounds sad sometimes, a family emergency, a sudden job transfer, something that makes you feel bad for pushing back.
The price is good but not crazy. Scammers have gotten smarter. They do not post a $600 one-bedroom anymore because nobody believes that. They post something at $1,100 when the real market is $1,400. Close enough to seem possible, low enough to make you move fast.
The photos are stolen. Real apartments, real photos, wrong person claiming to own them. You can check this by saving the photo and doing a reverse image search on Google. Sometimes you will find the same photo on a real listing from a real property company, and the address will not match what the scammer told you.
They ask for money before you see the place. This is the biggest one. No real landlord in a normal situation asks you to pay before you have walked through the door. Not a deposit, not a holding fee, nothing. If someone asks for money before you see the apartment in person, stop.
You can read more about what real application fees look like in my post on apartment application fees in Austin, which helps you know what is normal to pay and at what point in the process.
How to Check If a Listing Is Real
Here are the exact steps I use now before I take any listing seriously.
Search the address on Google Maps first. Make sure the building actually exists and looks like the photos. Street View is helpful for this.
Then go to the Travis County Appraisal District site and look up the owner. It is free. It takes about two minutes. The name on that site should match the name of the person or company renting to you. If it does not, ask why, and if the answer feels off, walk away.
Do a reverse image search on the listing photos. Save one photo, go to images.google.com, upload it, and see where else that photo appears online. If it shows up on a completely different listing for a different address, that is a scam.
Never pay before you see the place in person. That one rule alone would stop most rental scams cold.
If the landlord ever mentions mailing you keys, that is a scam. Full stop. No real landlord mails keys to a stranger before getting a signed lease and meeting them.
Before you commit to any place, it is also worth reading my post on how to document your apartment before move-in, because once you do find a real place, protecting yourself from day one matters a lot.
What Happened After I Walked Away
I reported the listing to Facebook Marketplace. I do not know what happened with it after that, whether it got taken down right away or sat there for more days catching other people. That part bothered me.
I kept looking and found my East Sixth Street apartment through a real property management company a few weeks later. The process was normal. I filled out an application, paid a real application fee in person, signed a real lease, and got a real key on move-in day. It cost more than the fake listing. Of course it did. But it was a real home.
The scam listing was still cheaper on paper. It was also going to take $500 from me and leave me with nothing. So.
Red Flags to Save in Your Head Right Now
Before you go looking for an apartment, keep these in your head.
| Red flag | What it usually means |
|---|---|
| Owner is out of town and cannot meet | Almost always a scam |
| Pay deposit before seeing the place | Stop, do not send anything |
| Keys will be mailed to you | Scam, always |
| Price is lower than everything nearby | Check it very carefully |
| Listing photos show up at a different address | Stolen photos, fake listing |
| Owner name does not match public records | Not the real owner |
Knowing your full renter rights before you sign anything real is also worth the time. I wrote a full post on renter rights for your first lease that covers what landlords can and cannot do once you are actually in a place. And if you ever feel pressured into paying hidden fees, my post on hidden fees in apartment leases shows what is normal and what is not.
FAQ
How common are rental scams in Austin?
Very common, especially when the market is hot and people are in a rush. The 2022 market was one of the worst for scams because everyone was desperate and moving fast. Scammers know that and they time their activity around exactly those moments.
What is the fastest way to check if a rental listing is real?
Look up the property address on the Travis County Appraisal District website and see who actually owns it. Then do a reverse image search on the listing photos. Those two steps together catch most fake listings in under five minutes.
Can scammers use real apartment photos?
Yes and that is what makes it scary. They take photos from real listings, sometimes from real property company websites, and repost them with a fake name and a fake story. The apartment in the photos is real. The person renting it to you is not.
What should I do if I already sent money to a scammer?
Report it to your bank right away and ask if the transfer can be stopped or reversed. Then report the listing to wherever you found it, Facebook, Craigslist, wherever. Also file a report with the FTC at reportfraud.ftc.gov and with the Austin Police Department. Getting the money back is hard but reporting helps stop the same scammer from hitting someone else.
Is it ever okay to pay before seeing an apartment?
No. Not a deposit, not a holding fee, nothing. If you cannot see it first, do not pay. A real landlord will understand that. Anyone who pushes back hard on this is someone you should walk away from fast.
What makes Austin rental scams different from other cities?
The market swings so hard here. When rent jumps $400 in a year like it did in 2022, people get scared and stop thinking clearly. Scammers know this. They target cities with fast-moving markets because fear makes people skip the checks that would catch them. My post on the rent increase of $400 in Austin shows how bad that year really was and why so many people were vulnerable.
Does the scam only happen on Facebook Marketplace?
No. Craigslist still has them. Zillow gets fake listings sometimes. Even newer apps are not immune. The platform does not matter as much as the steps you take to verify before you pay anything.
