Sunday 2 October 2022 07:21 AM Sydney luxury property: Real estate agents tell of run-ins with fake and ... trends now
High-end real estate agents are being plagued by fake buyers, who even get them to taste test pool water or fraudulently occupy private islands for use as sex traps.
The increase in pretend buyers has led the agent handling the sale of dead conwoman's Melissa Caddick's Sydney mansion to ask for a $10,000 deposit from those who want to inspect it.
Sydney buyer's agent Simon Cohen, who sells top-end property to an elite and usually discreet clientele, said a fake buyer once got far enough to get him to tell a poor staff member to taste a pool water to see if it was from the sea.
Those wanting to inspect the $10million Sydney property of fled conwoman Melissa Caddick will have to pay a refundable $10,000 to do so
The woman, who Mr Cohen described as an Audi-driver with mousy blonde hair and in her 40s, had come to him on the recommendation of a banker, which said she was looking for a property in the $30million price bracket.
It later turned out she had conned the banker, perhaps as she did initially Mr Cohen with fabricated stories of having just picked up matching black and white Porsches from a well-known dealer.
Top-end real estate agent Simon Cohen was once so taken in by a pretend buyer he had a staff member taste the pool water at a luxury property to keep the fraudster happy
Mr Cohen showed the woman five properties, and the one she chose was a waterfront house in the exclusive north Sydney suburb of Mosman.
Contracts were drawn up as the woman went into every detail about the house, including the pool taste test.
The con only came to light when the $3million deposit never turned up in the agent's account, despite the woman forging a Macquarie Bank transfer receipt for that amount.
'I don't know if it was a scam or a mental illness,' Mr Cohen told the Sydney Morning Herald.
'She wanted to think she was a $30million buyer. If it was a con, I'm not sure what the scam was.'
