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upfront fee scam nets 35,000 from a single victim

TUGBrian

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Passepartout

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P.T. Barnum said it best. In this case the scammers took advantage of this woman in her vulnerability. Maybe greed is it's own kind of vulnerability too. If the deal seems too good to be true, it probably is.

Jim
 

DeniseM

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How sad for the victim. When I read these stories, I always wonder if the person has problems managing other parts of their personal finances as well. Perhaps, in this case, the victim's husband always managed the finances prior to his illness, and she has little or no experience.
 

PamMo

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I can't fathom how anyone would give someone $35,000 to sell their Cabo timeshare, even if it was a high end fractional like Pueblo Bonito's Montecristo. Surely that's a misprint, or looking at the paperwork in the video, perhaps she is counting the inflated "offer" that she "lost"? The thought of some scumbag scamming her out of $35,000 is just too awful to stomach.
 
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Talent312

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TUGBrian

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I thought he was referring to the "a fool and his money are soon parted" as the pt barnum quote.
 

PigsDad

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I can't fathom how anyone would give someone $35,000 to sell their Cabo timeshare, even if it was a high end fractional like Pueblo Bonito's Montecristo. Surely that's a misprint, or looking at the paperwork in the video, perhaps she is counting the inflated "offer" that she "lost"? The thought of some scumbag scamming her out of $35,000 is just too awful to stomach.
I think that is the case. Looking at the video, the ~$35K includes the $18,850 "offer amount". Knowing how news agencies do their reporting, they probably thought the $35K would make a better story than the actual amount she got scammed.

Kurt
 

PamMo

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Although it's still pretty awful, isn't it?
 

T_R_Oglodyte

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Although it's still pretty awful, isn't it?
This is actually small time scam compared with others that have been pulled off. Compare this with the BelAir golf resort, nee U Hotels, scam in the PV Marina. IIRC, some people got hooked three times on that one.

Or the Sierra Rentals and Resales scam. Some of the people on the Sierra scam hot hooked up to five times to send in more money.
 

silentg

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This is so wrong.
 

BLKBRD370

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Heartless - absolutely heartless. There should be a special place in hell for those scammers.
I agree but the biggest scam in my opinion is the method o0f selling timeshares in the first place. Something must be done to alleviate the situation that timeshare find themselves in.
 

TUGBrian

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I agree but the biggest scam in my opinion is the method o0f selling timeshares in the first place. Something must be done to alleviate the situation that timeshare find themselves in.
we agree, and the solution for that is for owners to do research and find TUG before buying!
 

paschulea

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For those of you responding as to how foolish this person is, I would ask for your patience. The scams that are being ran use the same MO as abusive relationships. They totally get into the head of the person they are scamming.

People such as this who are reporting the scams are just trying to save others a similar grief. Please do not become part of the abusive cycle.
 
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