[onetwo_threefour]

Well, as a cautionary tale, I am a real estate lawyer, and despite taking what I think to be reasonable precautions I got scammed last year, although not exactly as described in the OP it's pretty close and based on my experience it's pretty damn hard to avoid. Here's my story.

I was building a new house last hear, possession in December, but wanted to sell my old place in the spring market for various reasons, so I was in the market for a six month rental. I got my wife to do the internet legwork, finding properties, making first contact with the landlord etc. It's a tough market finding a six month rental that will accept a large dog and kids, since options were limited and risk was higher. My wife found a place that was acceptable, if a little overpriced and went to look at it. She was happy enough to agree to rent it. Prior to signing a rental agreement or paying any money, I pulled taxes and title to the property to make sure that the guy I was dealing with was the owner. Lo and behold, the property had been transferred a few months earlier and the guy on title was not the guy who had it listed for rent. So I called and emailed the guy and asked him what his authority was for renting the property, to which he replied that he was the rental agent for the Owner. Obviously I wouldn't accept that at face value,so I told him to get me a letter and proof of ID from the owner on title confirming that this guy was authorized to rent out the property on his behalf. Surprisingly, I got short authorization letter signed and a notarized photocopy of the owners driver's license, so I went ahead with the transaction, renting from the numbered company of the agent (for which I also pulled a corporate search in an effort to confirm he was authorized to represent the corporation as well).

So after all this, we rent the property, couldn't get the landlord to fix the partially working fridge or the completely broken dryer, left the place in better condition than we found it two weeks before we were even supposed to be out, and still got stiffed on the deposit. The landlord wrote me bad cheque on a company account and I just spent six months chasing it. Luckily I had an articling student so it didn't really cost me anything other than aggravation, but there are so many different ways you can get screwed it's not even funny. Halfway through chasing my money from the owner he gets a lawyer to call me and plead that he was a victim of this fraudulent bad guy I rented from and wanted to give me half my deposit. I told him to go pound sand since I was out the money and he should have figured it out when I requested a letter form him and copy of his ID.