My partner rented out her inherited house nearly a year ago to a [Redacted to prevent false accusations] via a local estate agent in south london. In that time he has falsified his references, reverse charged his deposit, paid no rent and not paid for services he has ordered from locals tradespeople. If you come across him please DO NOT enter any agreement with him. He is a scammer. We now have a possession order and are pursuing him for prosecution for false representation. Avoid him please!
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You must remove his name
It is not legal to name him
You could get in a lot of trouble
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how did he reverse charge the deposit? What area is this?
quite possibly using a false name too? Did you check he had a right to rent?
He is using his real name. We used a very large company to check him out but they fell for a false documentation trail. Only when we started to check him out ourselves did we start to uncover the trail.
In answer to another question: he pays via credit card then tells the bank.later it was a payment made in error and gets them to reverse the charge back to his account. He is in south London.
I have written to over 650 estate agents in London about this man. He has broken the law, the police know him. It’s time he was outed for what he is. Landlords often get a real drubbing nowadays. We really look after our tenants. It’s time we fought back against those that are being protected by the law when they act illegally. We need to protect our communities .
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I can’t see any reference to this person or your property on OpenRent.
Can you confirm where you were introduced to this individual? And the name of the company you used for referencing? And the name of the company you used to process the deposit/rent, given this was done via credit card?
Currently your post could be interpreted as an issue via OpenRent, especially as you are posting on the OpenRent community, but I can’t see anything to support that and would like to make sure the facts are known / clear here.
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Individual got, I think, his last house but one from open rent. We were introduced to him by a local estate agent in south London. I have a LOT of documentation to prove his dealings: all have been lodged with the police.
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We were introduced to him by a local estate agent in south London
I have updated your original post to make this clearer. It is likely helpful to other landlords if you outline exactly what agency was used and the name of the company used for referencing so landlords are aware too.
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Dear Daz. This is to confirm that the agents we used, and who have lost their money too, were Alan de Maid. The agency they used for referencing was Homelet. I have done my best to be a good citizen and warn people. But as always it’s seems as though law protects criminals and not the genuine public. If I am blocked from trying to protect people, so be it. Someone else will suffer from this man’s behaviour soon. Stephen
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Totally agree with you . I wonder who blocked ? Come on ,if you are a landlord stand up and let us know. Or chicken out
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Can I say to anyone reading these notes that I am not being critical of Open Rent, who had no dealings with this man in my family’s rental. Anything posted is merely to alert potential landlords to exercise extreme caution with this man and, more generally, to advise undertaking your own reference checks as well as those provided by agents.
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there is a group called checkatenant - please add his name - I’ve not added mine to it yet but I need to do so. Good on you - Landlords need to stick together more.
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Thanks Susan. I will do that if possible 
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you can’t be too bad a tenant Susan if you’re willing to blacklist yourself 
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I had a viewing booked with a [Redacted] a week last Sunday. I’m in South London, so this could be the same guy. After 45 minutes waiting for him and he saying he was minutes away, I left. I was very annoyed, but am now very grateful.
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Let me know if you need visuals. 
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Lucky escape, not exactly a common name
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Was this through Openrent ?
Local agent, details above