A young couple looking to relocate to Cork have lost over €2,000 after a scammer advertising on Airbnb recreated a fake copy of the site.

The couple, who were looking at an ad for a place in Ballincollig, aren't the only ones who've fallen for the scam in recent months.

In one other case a young student going into UCC also lost out on around €600 when he paid money to someone purporting to own a property in Cork.

In the couple's case, an ad for an apartment was posted on Daft, Rent, and Airbnb and they contacted the seller on all three sites.

The "host" returned their messages on Airbnb and they started discussing the potentially renting the apartment long-term.

Speaking to CorkBeo, one of them explained how they agreed to take the place and a plan was made to book it through the website for the first month before drawing up a proper lease.

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They tried to send €2,460 to the seller but it didn't go through and he contacted them again via WhatsApp.

The scammer then blamed the failed transfer on an Airbnb mistake and sent them a link to a chat room purporting to be to the company's website.

The link actually sent them to a fake duplicate that looked exactly like Airbnb's real site and they started messaging someone on it that they thought was a worker.

The person purporting to be from Airbnb told them a mistake was made and gave them new bank details to make a transfer.

The woman said: "It was a two-bed apartment in Ballincollig. It was on Rent.ie, Daft, and AirBnb.

"So what I usually do when I see a place I'm interested in is apply through them all. So I did that and the "host" got back to me on AirBnb.

"He said he was happy enough and sent me terms for a short rental for a month. He said what we'd pay, what's included, and told us to go through AirBnb and book it for the month.

"He said after that month they'd do a proper lease then.

"So we booked it as normal from 29th August to 29th September. We then paid the deposit and first month of rent.

"When that happened it said we had to do it through bank transfer and gave an invoice with the details.

"So the first time we did it like that, but then he got onto us and said AirBnb contacted him saying there was something wrong with the account.

"He asked us to get onto AirBnb and sent a link to a live chat. I clicked on the link and it brought me to a chat page, I thought it was a legitimate AirBnb page. Everything about it was exactly the same but we now know it was some sort of fake site.

"So through that chat we were given different bank details and we went ahead then and "booked" the apartment.

"So the first part we dealt with AirBnb and that was all legit, but then the second page was a scam. It was only after I read that this happens all the time.

"It looked so real, and the apartment was listed on every website."

A few days went past and the couple were due to meet someone to get the keys. But the alarm was raised when the "host" claimed there was a problem with the transfer and asked to send it back and do it again.

Scammers will try move the deal from Daft.ie to sites like AirBnB in order to solicit a payment

"We never heard back from him and were supposed to meet. I was getting onto him and he was being really weird. I got onto AirBnb and gave them the reference number and the people there told me they didn't have anything in our names.

"That's when we knew. So he took the money, the ads were taken down. It was gone."

The couple went to the bank who are now trying to get the money back into their accounts.

"They said the only thing they can do it go through the fraud department, but there's always a risk they were just using the account to pass it on instantly and it's gone.

"They told me in most cases they do get the cash back, but there's always a risk they won't."

CorkBeo has contacted Airbnb for comment meanwhile people are being urged to double check the legitimacy of anyone purporting to be renting a house.

There's been many cases in Ireland where scammers are claiming to be landlords and concocting a story about being out of the country and unable to host viewings.

They then try and convince people to send money promising they'll send keys over.

Once the money is sent they completely disappear.

People are urged to dig deeper and verify that landlords are who they claim to be and that the properties they're interested in exist.

One easy way to check if an apartment or house advertised is dodgy

Users with doubts can always try one trick which might give a good clue as to where an ad is dodgy or not.

If you download the photos from an ad and use Google's reverse image search OR TinyEye you can see if they appear anywhere else on the web.

Many (but not all) scam advertisements may return results showing that the same pictures are being used in accommodation ads in different cities all around the world.