By Delaney White / Fox5 San Diego / March 24, 2025
A deal that was too good to be true cost a prospective renter in San Diego’s Ocean Beach thousands of dollars.
“I got fooled. It’s easy to get fooled,” said victim Alexzandria Moya. Alexzandria Moya said after posting on the Nextdoor app about needing a place to live, she was contacted by a woman offering a small one-and-a-half-bedroom house in Ocean Beach. That price is well below the average cost of rent for that area, which is about $2,500 a month, according to the Zumper rental market.
“It was going for I think she said $1,300, but I let her know my situation, that I needed a place kind of as soon as possible and I don’t have as much money, so she lowered it down to $1,000,” added Moya.
Moya said she set up a time to tour the property and a woman replied saying her niece can give a tour of the property. “I met the niece. She was 21, I do believe she is the scammer,” said Moya. After touring the property two more times, Moya was ready to move forward. “…and then sent me like a lease. I read it, it seemed legit, so I said, ‘okay, lets go through with this,’ and that’s when I brought her the money,” said Moya.
According to Moya, the woman was pressuring her to commit — saying other people also wanted the place, and that Moya needed to make an immediate cash payment if she wanted to get the home. “So I gave her $2,500 in total. $1,500 of it in cash, and then $1,000 through Zelle because that was my only way to get it to her right then and there.”
Moya said the move-in date kept getting pushed back and was told the property wasn’t ready — eventually she was told she could not move in at all and would be reimbursed. But the money never came. “I tried calling and it was a Google number…” said Moya. That went straight to voicemail and was not returned.
We called the number and were also sent to voicemail.
“I was hurt. I cried about it,” said Moya. Moya said she filed a police report, but fears she will never get her money back. San Diego County District Attorney Summer Stephan told us rental scams are very common.
“We know from the Better Business Bureau (BBB) that in the last two years, it’s gone up by 45 percent,” said Summer Stephan, San Diego County District Attorney. She said scammers often use tactics like claiming they are out of town, can’t show the property, have many other people interested, and need immediate payment. Stephan recommends looking at public records to confirm who owns the property and to pay using a credit card so there is a record of the transaction, and you can stop payment.
“These are really under reported. People often get scammed, and they’re embarrassed and they move on and they don’t report it. It’s really important to report it,” said Stephan.
Though it wasn’t the case in Moya’s situation, Stephan says scammers often take legitimate listings and copy them onto their own page with their own contact information and a lower price. She says simply doing a reverse image search could find the original listing. “That should be a red flag. Why are there two listings for the same home? Which one is the legitimate owner? Obviously, the one with the normal price and not the lower price,” said Stephan. “If it’s too good to be true then it’s not true,” said Stephan.
A lesson Moya learned the hard way. “Your own place for $1,000, it’s too good to be true,” said Moya.
We reached out to the San Diego Police Department about Alexzandria Moya’s case and they told us the investigation is ongoing.
The scammer had access to the property three different times to show it to her…how is that possible? I can see how the renter got fooled since the scammer had that kind of access to it.
If it is the same people that scammed me, they’re really good at what they’re doing.
I was duped…
I believe I was scammed by the same people, thousands of dollars… Alexzandria contact me.