Jeremy Scott thought he “lucked out” when he found a decent apartment in Byron for the right price.
But as they say, it was too good to be true.
London police have arrested a 38-year-old London, Ont. man in connection with at least five complaints of rental fraud, all involving the same apartment in Byron.
Scott says it all started when he posted in a few Facebook groups looking for an apartment for his family. A man reached out to him, saying he had a place.
Scott went with his wife to see the apartment on Sept. 18 — a two-bedroom for $1,200 all-inclusive. After everything seemed to check out they signed a lease and put down a deposit of $1000.
It wasn’t long before things started to fall apart.
“He stopped responding to text messages,” Scott said. “It was not until Oct. 21, I saw an ad on Facebook saying they got scammed by this person we signed the lease with.”
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Police says Darwish Jamil Chahbar has been charged with five counts of fraud under $5,000 and four counts of property obtained by crime under $5,000 in connection to five people.
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Police confirmed Scott’s case number is one of the five for which Chahbar is charged.
A father of two, Scott said they were fortunate they found out it was a scam before giving up their current apartment, but others were not so lucky.
Tara Brown said she was looking through Ads on a Facebook group for apartment rentals in London when she saw a comment by the accused which said he had a two-bedroom apartment in Byron on Commissioners Road W. for $1,200.
Brown said she went to view the apartment and put down a deposit after signing a lease. Then he asked her for the first month’s rent as well.
“I only had until the end of September to get out of our place because our lease was up, so I met with him the next day and paid first month’s rent.”
On Sept. 30, the day before she was supposed to move, Brown said that Chahbar texted her saying a water main had broken in the apartment and she was not able to move in.
With no apartment and no options, Brown said she had to move all of their stuff into storage and moved to Guelph to stay with her mother.
“There were five of us in a bachelor apartment and he even harassed me afterwards and led me on to mid-October saying he would get me my money back.”
Brown filed a report with London police that is currently under investigation but no charges have been filed in connection to her case yet.
Police are asking any victims of rental scams to contact their fraud department at 519-661-5515 Ext 5257.
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Chahbar is due back in court on Thursday.
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