It wasn't the classic Prince scam, but I was sort of scammed by a Nigerian once. I had an apartment to sublet for the summer, and put an ad on kijiji. A person emailed me the next day and said she was a quiet female student who needed a place very soon, but wasn't in town. She said that she was at home in Calgary.

There was a bit of back and fourth, which kept me from putting proper attention on placing the ad again and finding someone real. She didn't have perfect English, but her messages were short enough that it just seemed like the kind of mistakes someone lazy or not that bright would make. No real alarm bells were going off in my head. What can I say, I wasn't a savvy person at the time :(

In the end, June was just about to begin, and I had to move out to start my job. I didn't care if she saw the apartment or not, or even if I saw her, as long as I got a the money. So I asked for the damage deposit and first months rent in separate checks, plus two post-dated checks for the last two months rent, before I'd send her the keys.

She agreed, so I sent her the address to mail the checks to, and my phone number.

About a week later, I got an envelope with a stamp from Nigeria. But it wasn't a check from a bank, it was way too many American Express travelers checks. I was pretty pissed off so I threw them away. A guy called me later, probably to say, "OOPS, I sent too many checks, please cash them and send me cash, lol."

I wish I could say I said something clever, or at least gave him a piece of my mind, but I just hung up. He kept calling for a few days, but I didn't answer again.

This was a week into June, so if I wanted to try again, I would have to sublet for only two months, and drive back and fourth four hours to show the apartment and meet the person. And so I ended up paying the last three months of rent on my apartment instead of subletting.