Another Estate Seller, another scammer.

 

Putting this photo here, because its pretty and for attention. Yes, I took this photo for a neighbor's cattle business.

Back in 2012, a bit after my mother in law passed away, we had an estate sale to help us with the collected things from her life. Its was hard, and we were scammed. I am not speaking out of turn, the Texas Attorney General's office became involved, due to my blogging about it. That person not only scammed us but many, many others. She did time in prison. 

Flash forward to 2023. My mom couldn't stay by herself anymore. We had space for her, but not ALL her stuff. I asked the real estate agent if she had a referral for an estate seller. Especially working so far out of San Antonio, it was gonna be tough. She had a referral for us, a nice couple from San Antonio. We met them in the house after we moved all the things mom wanted to keep and they seemed nice. They were excited and between projects and could fit us in right away. 

I got mom moved (which is a whole other story) and sort of settled in Missouri with me, but we hadn't heard when the sale was to take place. Repairs still needed to be done before the house was to be listed and frankly we were anxious. 

They had moved in to sort through everything, okay. That's fine. The sale was finally set for the next week, March 9. We had my sister go as a secret shopper to see what was up. She went on the second day. 

Remember that I told you they moved in to sort through all the stuff (there were a lot of things left behind)? One of the things that was left behind was a queen sized cherry sleigh bed with a practically new mattress. We bought the bed at a high end furniture store in San Antonio for about 3,000.00 and the mattress when it was new, cost about 1500.00. Back in the 2010's this was a lot of money. Not inexpensive. And since this was a guest bed, it only had about 100 nights being slept in. Seriously. After that second day, Dana tells me that bed was not listed for sale as the room that it was in was closed with a sign on it saying "keep out".

I called the seller to complain. He assured me that all rooms were open. Since I wasn't there, I have no choice as I have other "fish to fry" up here in Missouri. 

After the sale, we found out the bed, 2 mountain bikes, a DR Chipper Shredder all didn't sell. With a small variety of books and such. I called the seller and he promised he would put the items on the FaceBook local Marketplace to sell. 10 days after the sale, we received the accounting for the sale and the $$ was transferred to mom's account.

I let the handyman we hired that the sale was done and that he could start anytime, the sooner the better. He started the next week. That Wednesday, I received an unusual text message from him. It said that the sellers were back taking the bed and the two bikes along with a several other items. That they insisted it was alright and that I knew. I also found out that we had inadvertantly left some boxes that were under that bed (didn't know they were there!) and the handiman was in the room when the "sellers" found those boxes (after the sale), her eyes grew wide and she immediately shut the box and walked it out to her car. I have no idea what was in the box... I'm thinking my dad's old Playboys. Wow.

Well, I didn't. I called, I left a message. I called the next day, I texted. I finally received a text message back. Here is that exchange:

Did you catch that they offered us 250 for the whole lot? I didn't just fall off the turnip truck. I did prepare a spreadsheet with the items that I knew of and the items that I guessed about and emailed it to him. Basically to let him know that I knew what he was up to, and that I knew the value of certain items..

During the exchange, (this took a few days), I was considering calling INS on his wife to prevent her from becoming a citizen as she and he just tried to rip us off.
We did receive a check for 1200.00. And while it was still not enough, I hope they learned their lesson. Since I had cc'd the referring party all these messages, I hope she doesn't refer any more clients to them.

There are tons of Estate Auctioneers up here. I'm talking everyone in the community goes to the property on a certain day, and everything is auctioned off. (Usually due to a death.) It seems more above board. It seems more honest. I don't know the cut they take, but the 2 estate sales that I was involved in San Antonio were rotten and both sellers were crooks. Seems like a trend.

If you want the names, I'll be happy to share. 

Be careful out there.