Mysterious Bulgarian Blonde ‘Loves’ My Flat!

Mysterious Bulgarian Blonde ‘Loves’ My Flat!

9:24 AM, 10th June 2015, About 9 years ago 33

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We have recently had quite a few changes of tenancies and have had lots of enquiries from Rightmove etc. However, the vast majority are scammers such as rent to rent and sub letters. Most scammers are easily weeded out over phone.  However, had a strange meeting last night with an attractive blond Bulgarian lady and her friend. She was very persistent to get a viewing, sold us a sob story about her experiences being ripped off by agents putting rent up after she put down deposit, loved the flat, it is a great flat with views over Olympic park, and wants to move in straight away. Mysterious Bulgarian Blonde Loves My Flat

The problem is nothing stacks up, i.e.

  • she produced payslips showing take home £3.5k pcm and this also showed on her bank statements. She brought these papers to the viewing but her English is fairly poor.
  • She says she works for a building company solely sourcing Bulgarian builders. The company has no website and has only been trading 9 months.
  • She says she works in canning town but couldnt remember the name of the road.
  • She says she currently shares a room in Stratford with her Mum who is a cleaner (seems a big jump from sharing a room to £1,650 pcm flat).
  • She will be sharing the flat with her Mum (who is in Bulgaria so we didn’t meet her) and she has taken time off work to fulfil her mums cleaning contracts.
  • She came along with a Scottish friend who says he is married to a Bulgarian woman who is a friend of our potential tenant. He says he also works in the construction industry and told me he lives in the same area of Hertfordshire as where the tenants employer is based. I Googled this during our meet and discovered he is the director of the company she says she works for! When I quizzed him on this he denied it.
  • They clearly tried to disarm us by flattery and holding simultaneous separate conversations.

Has anyone come across this pair or any ideas what the scam is? There have been brothels in the block before so this is my first thought. Must say they weren’t too good at deception. My wife was suspicious from the off especially as she had two mobiles. Only got them along out of curiosity and to create a buzz for another viewing.

This is not meant to be any slur against Bulgarians who in my previous encounters are absolutely fine!

Regards

Joe


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Comments

Shakeel Ahmad

22:39 PM, 10th June 2015, About 9 years ago

Indeed. If all stacks up in terms of references etc , I will ask her to take the cover off and if she objects to it I will not be offended but will not rent her the flat. As I would like to recognize my tenants.

I use Agents. However my Agent is not allowed to sign the contract and the process does not move forward until I meet the tenants for a coffee or a drink.This helps all concerned. It would be difficult if the they are covered or wearing a balaclava.

Joe Bloggs

0:04 AM, 11th June 2015, About 9 years ago

Reply to the comment left by "Tony Atkins" at "10/06/2015 - 17:23":

hi tony,

he has been living in uk for 4 years plus and knew full well when he enquired about the flat that it was a whole flat, not half a flat!

this is a luxury flat and if he is going to plead poverty (which he isnt) he should view something cheaper.

we are not keen on sub-letting as we will loose control as to the type of person living there etc.

Joe Bloggs

0:15 AM, 11th June 2015, About 9 years ago

Reply to the comment left by "Mark Alexander" at "10/06/2015 - 21:26":

hi mark

a lot of my tenants are eastern european and im not sure what you mean about racial prejudices.

my experience is that eastern european women are not discriminated against and are becoming more and more successful. such tenants are our preferred target...must say that unfortunately white anglo saxon tenants are IMO one of the worst (dangerous to generalise I know).

many e. european women do start off as cleaners and learn good business skills which they take into new businesses.

Shakeel Ahmad

0:20 AM, 11th June 2015, About 9 years ago

Reply to Joe.
They start as cleaners etc due to language or not having other skills. One thing for sure that they keep the place cleaner than I can keep flat.

Joe Bloggs

0:32 AM, 11th June 2015, About 9 years ago

UPDATE

if we took the blond bimbo (she made a big thing of checking her look in the mirror as she left and just spoke to my wife about shopping and her new haircut!) i would have no hesitation when renewing the insurance of stating that her status was professional...the oldest one.

my wife has done some good sleuthing (enabled by her other name appearing on my wifes FB) and she looks much better in the flesh than when she had clothes on when we met. so im quite sure the plan was to use it as a brothel and im guessing the scottish 'construction manager' (building erections?) must have been the pimp.

we sent her a text tonight saying we wont be renting to her and got an immediate reply thanking us. which was nice.

we now realise the pimp made a little secret joke. when i asked her if she shares the room with her mum, the pimp said she didnt have any love life!

thanks for all your comments...gut instinct is usually right.

Shakeel Ahmad

8:39 AM, 11th June 2015, About 9 years ago

It seems I was right.

Sunny Rsa

18:27 PM, 12th June 2015, About 9 years ago

Alarm bells!!!

Two issues that would concern me:

1- Why didn't she go to a estate agent with all her credibilities instead of coming direct to you?

2- Her feminine charm.

The last time I made a mistake and fell for it was not because I fell for Romanian woman's feminine charm but because I felt sorry for her when she told me that she just arrived into the UK and found out that her relative was not going to accommodate her and she desperately needed somewhere to live. Little did I know that he had been thrown out by her previous landlord and instead of doing things by the book, I got a bit too emotionally involved and I did not check references, proof of earnings etc. As soon as she moved in, she told me a long story that she could nit work because she has cancer...So I fell again for her...

In the end I was stung £8k rent arrears, nearly two years of sleepless nights and I got locked up for 20 hours by Met Police because the lodger made a false allegation against me that I tried to strangle her and she got her boyfriend to stand as a witness. The police dropped the case but I still end up being locked up on Guy Fawkes night. That taught me a lesson never mix business with personal feelings. From that day I also learnt the true meaning of Karma and so I don't give a beggar money. Food, clothing etc yes but nothing of value. If someone was born a beggar they will remain a beggar until they leave this world and I should not be interfering with their Karma otherwise God will punish me instead.

Not all Bulgarians are bad. Romanians are worse. I have a lodger who I have known for four years. He is a gentleman. I can talk with my lodger to interpret for you if you need an interpreter.

My advice is, do everything by the book and get your references especially from the last landlord and you will be fine.

Good Luck

Jay James

20:06 PM, 12th June 2015, About 9 years ago

Utterly distasteful.

Flawed reasoning in attempting to justify use of generalised characteristics in discussing supposed business judgements of the unknown.

Nicholas Richards

11:22 AM, 13th June 2015, About 9 years ago

Definitely one of 118's more entertaining threads!

Joe Bloggs

19:04 PM, 14th June 2015, About 9 years ago

Reply to the comment left by "Sunny Rsa" at "12/06/2015 - 18:27":

hi sunny,

we dont use agents, so that is why she came to us direct. we advertise on rightmove. i do suspect that dodgy tenants think that dealing direct with LL's will be easier as they are more gullible.

i agree that its important to keep things very business like. my wife takes this to extremes and wont even accept a cup of tea! perhaps that question should be a new thread on 118!

i dont agree with your statement:
'If someone was born a beggar they will remain a beggar until they leave this world and I should not be interfering with their Karma otherwise God will punish me instead'
Im not religious so i dont believe in karma. i think there are loads of examples of people who have had misfortune, but recover from dire circumstances before they die. and what sort of god will punish you for being kind? is the converse true that if you are wicked god will reward you.

sorry to hear of your arrest. that is terrible and she should have been charged with wasting police time.

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