SCAM ALERT!!!! Be Careful!!!

[Heather Bettis]

Hi Everyone,

My husband owns a handyman business and in the last week we have gotten text messages (which are not uncommon for our customers), however the 3 texts I am referring to are scams and I just wanted to share with other contractors so that you are aware.

Each of the 3 texts started out asking about a specific service our company offers such as one was hardwood floor install, and the third pressure washing, don't remember what the second one was without looking.

The first one gave me a red flag when I asked where they found out about our company when they gave me a website our company is not listed on, but I played along to see where they were going with this. It ended up that they wanted new hardwood floors installed in the entire house and gave me the address to the home in Sweetwater, TN where we are located. I googled the address to find that it was a home listed for sale that had already been completely remodeled including new beautiful hardwood floors that you could see in the pictures. Then I got the "I'm out of town" and I need to pay with a credit card more than the cost so you can pay the previous owner to get the key. No thank you not interested.

The others were pretty close to the same although the third did get where he found our company listed right, but I didn't waste as much time texting with the second and third. I got to the addresses, googled to see for sale, and checked the county records to see who owned them and to see that the original name given was not the same as owner then quickly got to the question of how they would pay from out of state. Then I mentioned that that house was for currently for sale and that ownership did not match their name "can you tell me who you purchased the house from?" On all three once I asked for verification of who they purchased from the texts stopped.

I am glad that I knew enough to see the red flags in these text, and I know most of you will as well, but wanted to put it out there so that we are all aware and if there are a few out there that don't know what to look for in such a situation to hopefully help them from being scammed.

I suggest always ask specific questions that only a legit customer would know such as how did you find out about our company? That's always my number one question not only for marketing purposes but because we are only listed in a few places and most of our customers come from one main website we are listed on. I do know it's hard to determine if a customer is legit by text especially now that I know there are investors from out of state that could very well be looking to hire us, but be very careful because this scam has shown up on my phone 3 times over the past week and they are all out of town or out of the states for treatment of one type or another and all the houses are publicly listed for sale in my service area.

I have been very careful to ask several specific questions because I know there could be legit investors looking to hire us for their out of state investments, but after 3 very similar texts I am sure it is a scam so just be careful!