Rental scams in Australia: official warnings, figures and checks

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Kooky

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A rental scam needs very little: a set of photographs, a real street address and a renter who is asked to pay before stepping inside. Scamwatch, the scam reporting service run by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, has carried a page on fake rental listings since 2008, and the state consumer regulators have added their own warnings as the method has changed. The newest variant, described by Consumer Protection in Western Australia in June 2025, copies the regulator itself: a forged email tells the renter that the bond has been safely lodged.

This guide sets out how the official bodies describe the scam, which figures they have published and for which periods, the checks they list for a renter, what those checks look like from the agency's side of the desk, and where a loss is reported. It rests on five official pages: two from Scamwatch, two from Consumer Protection in Western Australia and one from Consumer Affairs Victoria. Where those pages are silent, the guide says so, and its last section lists what could not be confirmed.

Scamwatch release of 21 September 2020, rental and accommodation scams.

How Scamwatch defines a rental scam

Scamwatch's reference page is titled "Fake rental properties and shared accommodation listings". It is dated 20 August 2008 and its page data shows a modification on 9 December 2025. The definition is short. Scammers post fake rental and shared accommodation listings online. The listings carry photographs and real addresses so that they look genuine, and the page points out that these details are easy to find online. The person presenting as the owner then gives reasons why the property cannot be inspected and asks for money upfront, or for personal details, to "secure" the rental.

Three elements of that definition matter for anyone auditing a listing. The first is that a real address proves nothing: the home may exist and belong to someone else. The second is that the request has two possible targets, money or personal details, and the scam succeeds if it obtains either. The third is the method of payment. Scamwatch names money transfer as the usual channel and states that money sent this way is rarely recovered.

The page lists four warning signs: an offer that seems too good to be true, repeated excuses for why the property cannot be viewed, an upfront fee to secure the property paid by money transfer, and a prospective landlord who lives overseas. The absent owner is the thread that ties them together, because it explains at once why nobody can open the door and why the money has to travel electronically.

The tactics added in the 2020 warning

On 21 September 2020 Scamwatch published a release titled "Rental scams targeting more Australians during pandemic". It widened the description well beyond the 2008 page. According to that release, fake listings were appearing on real estate and classified websites, and scammers were also approaching people who had posted on social media that they were looking for a room. In other words, the renter did not have to find the fake advertisement; the scammer could find the renter.

The release describes a sequence. The rent is set low. An upfront deposit is requested to secure the property. Keys are promised once payment is made, and then excuses arrive, each paired with a request for a further payment, until the scammer stops replying. Scamwatch lists the signs that go with it: pressure to pay before inspecting, a conversation that runs only by email, and rent well below the market.

Two tactics in the release go further than a fake advertisement. The first is impersonation. Scamwatch reports scammers posing as real estate agents and organising fake inspections, after which the renter finds that the property does not exist or is already occupied. The second is the harvesting of documents. The release describes a fake "tenant application form" used to collect personal information, and requests for identity documents such as passports, bank statements or payslips. The ACCC set out the consequence in the release: once a scammer holds personal information, the person is at risk of further scams or identity theft.

This is the point where a rental scam stops being only a payment loss. A renter who paid nothing but sent a passport scan and three payslips has still handed over the material for a later fraud, and the official guidance treats that as a harm in its own right.

The national figures, and how old they are

The only national figures in the pages read for this guide are those of the September 2020 release, and they should be read with their date attached. Scamwatch reported that more than A$300,000 had been lost to rental and accommodation scams in 2020 up to the date of the release, a rise of 76 per cent on the same period of the year before. It had received 560 reports, a rise of 56 per cent. People aged 25 to 34 reported the most rental scams in 2020, and most reports came from New South Wales, Victoria and the Australian Capital Territory.

A worked example shows what those percentages imply, on the assumption that both rises are measured against the same months of 2019 and that the loss was exactly A$300,000, which is the floor of what Scamwatch reported. Dividing A$300,000 by 1.76 gives about A$170,455 for the earlier period. Dividing 560 reports by 1.56 gives about 359 reports. Losses therefore grew faster than reports: the amount lost per report rose from about A$475 (A$170,455 divided by 359) to about A$536 (A$300,000 divided by 560). These are derived figures, not ones Scamwatch published, and because a report can be made without any loss they are not the loss of a typical victim.

Two cautions apply. These are reports made to one service, so they count what renters chose to report and not every scam. And they are six years old on the date of this guide. No later national figure for rental scams appeared in the official pages consulted, which is recorded as an open point at the end.

What Western Australia's regulator has counted

Consumer Protection in Western Australia is the one state regulator, among the pages read, that publishes its own rental scam counts. They come from WA ScamNet, its scam reporting service, and they appear in two media releases.

The first, published on 9 April 2021, said that 18 rental scam reports had been received so far that year and that five people had lost a total of A$7,200. The second, published on 20 June 2025, gave a full year and a part year: 45 reports, 16 victims and A$39,935 lost across 2024, then 35 reports, 12 victims and A$27,875 lost in 2025 up to the release. The regulator described 2025 as on track to surpass the 2024 totals.

Two things can be computed from the table, both as worked examples from the published totals. The first is the share of reports that ended in a loss: 5 of 18 in early 2021 (27.8 per cent), 16 of 45 in 2024 (35.6 per cent) and 12 of 35 in the first part of 2025 (34.3 per cent). Put the other way, between 64 and 72 per cent of reports in each period carried no recorded loss. The second is the average loss per victim: A$1,440 in early 2021 (A$7,200 divided by 5), about A$2,496 in 2024 (A$39,935 divided by 16) and about A$2,323 in 2025 to 20 June (A$27,875 divided by 12).

The regulator's "on track" remark can also be tested with simple arithmetic, on the assumption that reports arrive evenly through the year, which nothing in the release guarantees. The 20th of June is the 171st day of 2025. Thirty-five reports in 171 days is a pace of about 75 over 365 days, against 45 in 2024, and A$27,875 in 171 days is a pace of about A$59,500, against A$39,935. That is an illustration of the pace at the release date and not a result: the releases read for this guide give no full-year total for 2025.

The sums are small beside the national total, and the releases explain why they still matter. The 2021 release describes one household that lost A$3,600, made up of a A$2,000 bond and A$1,600 of rent, after answering an advertisement on Facebook Marketplace and driving past the home without going in. On the agreed day the keys were not where they were supposed to be, and the home was occupied by tenants who held an agreement with the legitimate agent. A second household lost a A$1,800 bond; the advertisement vanished once the payment was made and the email account behind it was deleted.

The fake bond confirmation

The June 2025 release from Consumer Protection describes a development that changes what a renter can treat as proof. After the first payment, the renter receives an email that appears to come from the regulator's own Bonds Administration team and states that the residential tenancy bond has been received. According to the release, these emails use Western Australian Government letterheads and official forms copied from the Consumer Protection website.

The purpose is to buy time. A renter who believes the bond is held by the state has no reason to doubt the landlord, and the release says the forged confirmation is then used to ask for more money, including further rent in advance. Its example is a man who lost A$2,400. He had met the supposed landlord in person and was told the inside could not be viewed because the home was tenanted. A fake bond lodgement email followed, then further demands.

The regulator's test for the email is the sender's address and nothing else. Genuine emails about security bonds, it says, come only from addresses on the Western Australian Government's own domain, and hovering over the sender's name shows the real address. In the regulator's account, a letterhead and a form can be copied, and the sending address is the element the release tells renters to rely on. The release adds that a renter who is unsure whether a bond was lodged can ask the Bonds Administration team directly.

Two details of the case deserve attention. Meeting the landlord face to face did not protect the renter, although meeting in person is one of the standard tips; the meeting took place outside a home whose interior stayed closed. And the letterhead and forms were genuine in appearance because they were copied from a public website. The release therefore moves the weight of proof from how a document looks to where it comes from.

Inspection, the check every source puts first

Every one of the five pages puts the inspection first, and they agree on what counts as one. Scamwatch's reference page says to insist on an inspection and adds that a drive-by is not enough, because the property may exist but belong to someone else. Consumer Protection's 2025 release asks for an inspection in person before signing or paying. Consumer Affairs Victoria, on a page published on 3 March 2025 and updated on 8 December 2025, treats a rental provider's refusal of an in-person inspection as a red flag, and describes the request that goes with it: one month's rent and a bond, asked for before any inspection is allowed.

The inspection does two jobs. It shows that the home is real and empty or about to be, and it shows that the person offering it has lawful access to it. The Western Australian cases describe the excuses that remove both proofs: the owner is overseas or interstate, the keys will be left hidden outside once the bond and rent are paid, or tenants are living there so only the outside can be seen.

For a renter who cannot attend, the sources offer substitutes without calling them equivalent. Consumer Protection lists two desk checks: a reverse image search on the photographs, and a search of the address to see whether the property exists or is being advertised by another agency. Scamwatch's reference page warns against relying on information from anyone the advertiser recommends.

Confirming who is on the other side

The second group of checks concerns identity. Scamwatch's 2020 release tells renters to check that the agent is licensed, to find the agency's telephone number independently and not from the advertisement or the email, and to speak to the property manager by phone or in person before paying. Consumer Affairs Victoria gives the same check from another angle: when someone says they work for a real estate agency, ask the agency itself to confirm it. Scamwatch's older page adds a search on the name and the email address of the person making the offer.

Consumer Protection frames the choice as one of two acceptable counterparties: a landlord the renter can meet face to face, or a licensed real estate agent. Its 2021 release goes a step further and recommends renting through a licensed real estate or property management agency over answering online advertisements, especially for a home that has not been seen. The 2025 case shows the limit of the first option, since a face-to-face meeting took place and the loss still followed.

The pages tell renters to check a licence but do not explain how. None of the five names a licence register or describes how to search one, in any state. Where and how a licence is confirmed is therefore left open here; Scamwatch's release sends renters to their state consumer protection agency for questions about bonds and tenants' rights, and that is as far as these sources go.

Where the money goes: bond, rent and receipts

The third group of checks follows the payment. Consumer Affairs Victoria is the most direct. It advises against money transfer services and against depositing funds straight into a bank account, and says that with a bank transfer there is little chance of getting the money back. For a Victorian rental it gives one positive test: the renter should receive a receipt from the Residential Tenancy Bond Authority, named on the page by its initials, RTBA.

Consumer Protection's guidance for Western Australia is built around an exchange. Any money the renter agrees to pay is handed over in return for the keys and a signed copy of the lease on the prescribed form, which the release identifies as Form 1AA. A direct bank transfer is treated with care unless the renter is certain the payee is a licensed real estate agent. And a bond confirmation is checked by its sender's address, as described above.

Read together, the two states describe the same control. The bond is not meant to rest with the person who collected it; a state body records it and tells the renter so. A scam has to break that chain somewhere, either by taking the money and sending nothing, or, as in the 2025 cases, by forging the message that closes the loop. The maximum bond, the deadline for lodging it and the penalty for not doing so are not stated in the pages read for this guide.

The same checks, seen from an agency

None of the five pages is addressed to agencies, and none sets out a checklist for them. What they do show is where a genuine agency's name, listings and staff appear inside someone else's fraud, and which questions a careful renter has been told to put to the office.

Scamwatch's 2020 release reports scammers posing as real estate agents and arranging fake inspections. Consumer Protection's 2021 release describes a home that was advertised by a scammer while it was let through a legitimate agent, whose tenants were living in it. Its tips assume that a renter will search an address to see whether another agency lists it. Photographs lifted from a genuine advertisement are what the reverse image search is designed to find.

From those points, an agency reviewing its own exposure can read off the enquiries it should expect, each of which comes straight from official advice to renters:

1. A call to the office number, found independently, asking whether a named person works there (Consumer Affairs Victoria; Scamwatch).
2. A request to confirm that the agency holds a licence and manages the property at a given address (Scamwatch; Consumer Protection).
3. A request for an inspection inside the home before any payment (all five pages).
4. A question about who the payee is, since Consumer Protection advises care with a bank transfer unless the payee is certainly a licensed agent.
5. A request for the bond authority's own confirmation, and in Western Australia a check of the address it was sent from.

Whether an agency can answer each of these quickly, and whether its staff know that renters have been told to ask them, is a matter for its own procedures. The sources do not say what an agency must do when it learns its listing has been copied; Scamwatch's advice to a person who has been scammed is to notify the platform where it happened, and the pages go no further than that.

Identity documents and the first hours after a loss

The steps after a loss are set out in Scamwatch's 2020 release, in this order: speak to the bank as soon as possible, notify the platform where the scam took place, and approach IDCARE, which the release describes as a free, government-funded identity theft service. The third step applies even where no money moved, because the release treats documents sent to a scammer as a continuing risk.

Scamwatch's reference page deals with evidence. A renter who accepts an offer is told to keep copies of all correspondence, the banking details used and the listing itself, and after a scam to note where the advertisement was found and who was spoken to. The Western Australian cases show why the listing should be saved early: in one, the advertisement disappeared as soon as the payment was made and the email account was deleted.

Recovery is not promised anywhere in these pages. Scamwatch says money sent by transfer is rarely recovered, and Consumer Affairs Victoria says there is little chance of getting a bank transfer back. The speed of the first call to the bank is the only factor the sources single out.

A real address, a copied letterhead and a meeting in person have each appeared in a reported scam. None of them is the check the regulators put first.

Where to report, and what stays unconfirmed

The reporting points named in the five pages are these. Nationally, Scamwatch takes reports through its "report a scam" page. In Western Australia, reports and questions go to WA ScamNet, run by Consumer Protection, and questions about whether a bond was lodged go to the Bonds Administration team. In Victoria, a rental scam is reported to Consumer Affairs Victoria. The platform that carried the advertisement is told separately; in one Western Australian case the release notes that a report was lodged with the social media company. The bank is told first of all.

Several parts of the subject could not be confirmed from primary pages for this guide and are left open here.

• New South Wales and South Australia. No rental scam statement from NSW Fair Trading or from Consumer and Business Services in South Australia was read. The only statement about New South Wales in this guide is Scamwatch's 2020 remark that it was among the three jurisdictions with the most reports.
• Licence registers. The pages advise checking that an agent is licensed, without naming a register or a search method for any state.
• Bond rules. Maximum amounts, lodgement deadlines and penalties are not given in these pages.
• Police and cybercrime reporting. The pages name the bank, the platform, Scamwatch, the state regulator and IDCARE; they do not describe a police or cybercrime reporting channel.
• Recent national figures. The latest national count found is Scamwatch's, to 21 September 2020. Western Australia's run to 20 June 2025.

What the pages do establish is consistent across pages dated from 2008 to 2025 and across three bodies. The scam depends on payment before access. Each official check, whether it is the inspection, the independent phone call or the bond authority's receipt, is a way of making access, identity and custody of the money verifiable before the payment is made, and which of them applies in a given case depends on the state and on who is offering the home.

Kooky, from Shaka

Kooky edits Agents Estate and builds Shaka, the payment router he made for real estate professionals. One payment comes in, and every agent, agency and party in the deal receives their signed share on closing date.

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