We were robbed!!!

This past week, we were robbed by a scam that I knew existed just didn’t think it would happen to us. Someone called on our home for sale and scheduled an appointment to come see it. When they arrived in a taxi, I should have been alarmed but took him on his word that he was new to Costa Rica and hadn’t yet bought a car.

He got our name out of the For Sale by Owner magazine online. The ad was only posted on Thursday night and the scammer called us on Friday morning wanting to see the property that day. He explained that his family was living in Mexico and he wanted to bring them here as soon as he found a home for them. He was Costa Rica that didn’t speak a word of English.
He came into our home and took the tour like any other person that has seen the house. He asked for a computer to check to see that we in fact owned the property with the Registro. He also asked to talk with our attorney by phone to schedule a closing for later in the day. He did speak with our attorney and made all the arrangements to meet and close that day. He offered us what we were asking for the house and wanted to close the same day. Seemed to be too good to be true, then as the rule goes….it probably is.
Where we screwed up was when he wanted to measure the rooms. We (knowing better) left him alone for 30 seconds and in that time he took all of my jewelry and my daughters new digital camera. We of course didn’t realize this until he was far gone. He stated that he was going to the bank to get the checks to close on the house and of course we never heard from him again.

This guy was in our home for close to 3 hours asking to see plat maps, talk to our attorney and check the property with the registry. He seemed totally legit so when he asked to measure the rooms, we never dreamed he would steal us blind.

The very disturbing part of this is that we allowed this bad person into our home. The stupid part is that we trusted him and didn’t follow him as we should have throughout the house.

Unfortunately this type of thing happens all the time in Costa Rica and I suppose in other parts of the world as well. It is sad that we can’t trust people we bring into our own home.

Beware of another scam for those of you thinking of selling your home. And if your looking and the owners seem a little wary, this is why.

There is no chance that we will ever see our lost items again and that makes me very sad. We have lived in Costa Rica for over 5 years and have had very few mishaps but this one takes the cake.