Don’t do it.  Most likely a scam

Definitely.  My gut just told me something was fishy.  This happened several years ago too, I remember, and someone posted something similar.  As soon as I saw Western Union, I was thinking NO WAY.

Larry, how did he/she get your email address?

My profile.

Seller has a profile?

Long term member?

Open to other methods of payment...I.E. PayPal ?

T.C.A / L.C.C.A. or club affiliations?

Known associates here on forum who can vouch for?

Sorry but Western Union is a BIG red flag.

As an after thought........House is for sale? Call realtor and ask who's selling? Could be an estate being liquidated.

Larry Mullen posted:

Definitely.  My gut just told me something was fishy.  This happened several years ago too, I remember, and someone posted something similar.  As soon as I saw Western Union, I was thinking NO WAY.

Good call, western union is the clue, once you use them they will not give any refunds. A scammer tried doing that with me stating he was a able to sell new power tools for lowes. Guaranteed delivery on Sunday and payment by western union.. 

justakid posted:

Seller has a profile?

Long term member?

Open to other methods of payment...I.E. PayPal ?

T.C.A / L.C.C.A. or club affiliations?

Known associates here on forum who can vouch for?

 

Sorry but Western Union is a BIG red flag.

In my last email I asked him what his forum name was; I haven't heard back.  Didn't ask about any affiliations because I was pretty sure it was a scam.  Too bad there isn't a way keep these people off of here.

Anybody who asked to be paid via Western Union is scamming you. 

I would think the very least a person would do when emailing you is to include their Forum Profile Name , to add to their legitimacy ... I for one would not deal with someone out of the blue asking to be paid by non refundable methods ... just smells too far off ...

Western Union?  !00% Bogus

One way I have used to check an address is to locate it on Google maps, and zoom in; then switch to street view and see actual pictures of the place.  I also use this system to check public garages for overhead height before I show up with my Yukon

Today there are several ways to pay someone selling an item.  Western Union is not one of them.  It is mainly used to send money out of the USA to foreign countries..... 

justakid posted:

As an after thought........House is for sale? Call realtor and ask who's selling? Could be an estate being liquidated.

 

Ethical realtor won't disclose that.  However, if you have a street address, you can look up ownership information via the county's real estate tax records.

Larry Mullen posted:

Definitely.  My gut just told me something was fishy.  This happened several years ago too, I remember, and someone posted something similar.  As soon as I saw Western Union, I was thinking NO WAY.

The fact that you posted about this says that you really knew the answer to begin with.  While going with one's gut is often a poor way to make a decision, in this case it's the right call.

A non-train forum that I'm on requires a person to make 50 "quality" posts before they can access the want to buy and for sale sections.  "Quality" means that throwaway posts like "I like it", "wow", etc. don't count.  This doesn't eliminate the riff raff, but it cuts it way down.  There's a lot of self-policing by forum members - if someone appears to be "racing to 50 posts", they get called out and the moderators handle it.

A V O I D.

No. NO. and NO!!!

Larry Mullen posted:

I had posted a Wanted Ad and received a pleasant email back.  Seller had the item but wanted to be paid via Western Union.  The property address listed in the email  is for sale and doesn't appear to be furnished.   Since we look out for each other here, I was curious if anyone received a similar response from the same person.  Thanks.

 

 

Don’t do it!!!  It is a SCAM!  Almost got caught up in it a few years back!!  How did they get your E-Mail address?  I used to put mine on the ADD.  I don’t do that anymore!  Tell them to go to Profile !!!

That gives you “Some” protection !!!

Just for every ones information last year I had a situation were I posted a wanted to by add without name or any contact information in add. Told respondents to go to profile. Scammer got my e-Mail some how.

FWIW, don’t pay by Money Gram either.  I almost fell for that but asked here first.

This is the likely result of that transaction.

justakid posted:

Seller has a profile?

 It was explained recently if the person had not made any posts since registering, it's very hard to track them down.

Larry Mullen posted:

justakid posted:

Seller has a profile?

Long term member?

Open to other methods of payment...I.E. PayPal ?

T.C.A / L.C.C.A. or club affiliations?

Known associates here on forum who can vouch for?

 

Sorry but Western Union is a BIG red flag.

In my last email I asked him what his forum name was; I haven't heard back.  Didn't ask about any affiliations because I was pretty sure it was a scam.  Too bad there isn't a way keep these people off of here.

Larry....if in fact the seller got your email from your profile, then this is a member of the forum.  Non-members can not see your profile info unless you list it in the spaces that have the little world symbol next to the blank.  It is a shame that we may have a scammer as a member on this forum.  If you have his email, please forward it to me and also his address if you have it...

gunrunnerjohn posted:

This is the likely result of that transaction.

 

justakid posted:

Seller has a profile?

 It was explained recently if the person had not made any posts since registering, it's very hard to track them down.

That is not true.  If someone has registered and been approved, it does not matter if they have made any posts.  We can find them as long as we find out their avatar name.  We can also track various IP addresses, locations, etc....  It appears that whoever this person is does not ever tell their real "name" on the forum and uses a separate email address as well as a different shipping address than the one with which they registered.

Consider me corrected Alan, obviously the previous information i got was mis-information.

OGR CEO-PUBLISHER posted:

Larry....if in fact the seller got your email from your profile, then this is a member of the forum.  Non-members can not see your profile info unless you list it in the spaces that have the little world symbol next to the blank.  It is a shame that we may have a scammer as a member on this forum.  If you have his email, please forward it to me and also his address if you have it...

You saw the part where the address is a vacant house for sale, right?

It seems pretty clear this person was planning on checking the mailbox of an unoccupied home each day to look for his free Western union payments.

-Dave

RJR posted:

One way I have used to check an address is to locate it on Google maps, and zoom in; then switch to street view and see actual pictures of the place.  I also use this system to check public garages for overhead height before I show up with my Yukon

An omniscient as Google seems to be, there are streets the Google car haven't driven down, believe it or not!  And any pictures are not necessarily current, they are from whenever the Google car happened to drive down the street.  Could be a few days (or whatever lag there is from a trip to including it on Maps), or it could be a few years ago.

My whole area used to be skipped, but I see some streets are now covered.

Looking up the address on realtor.com to see if it's up for sale and empty is probably a good 1st cut.  I'm guessing that's how the OP found out it was a vacant house.

-Dave

No, they live near the address.

They need to grab the mail from the house unless they tried to get it wired.