10 hilarious responses the Reddit thread r/Milwaukee had to spam texts to sell their home
Random text messages inquiring about a specific address or asking if you are interested in selling a home are part of a larger rise in spam texts, according to the spam-blocking company RoboKiller, which reported Americans received 14.3 billion spam texts last month.
These automated text messages from real estate professionals and some scammers are — unlike emails — hard to ignore and for many across the country, represent the newest and most irritating form of spam.
The spam texts can even be confusing if you don’t own a home or know about the property in question.
When Sarah Kober finally bought a home in the summer of 2021, she thought she would finally stop receiving spam text messages meant for her landlord, “Ken.”
She didn’t.
She started receiving messages while she was still a renter from someone asking her if she wanted to sell the property owned by her former landlord. Eventually, solicitors started asking to buy a different home she had lived in, the home she currently owns and even her former landlord’s personal home.
These days, Kober said she receives text messages and emails from people asking to purchase a property at least once a month.
Kober said she's taken steps to protect her identity, emailing companies Intelius, Radaris and Spokeo — which collect personal information from documents and online sources and make it available to the public, often for a fee — asking to be removed from their databases. She also said she has told text solicitors she is not Ken and is not associated with that property anymore. But she still gets the messages.
Kober said she wishes we had strong privacy laws like those in California, which has more restrictions on online privacy and unsolicited commercial communications. Some, such as spam laws and a law about unsolicited cell phone/pager text ads, specifically prohibit this kind of frequent text solicitations.
“It pisses me off because I do a lot of work not to have my name or cell phone easily able to find,” Kober said. “I mean, it’s like going up to someone and being like, ‘Hey, nice car, can I buy it from you real quick?’”
Kober’s experience isn’t unique.
According to the spam-blocking company RoboKiller, spam texts reached a peak in 2022 during the month of December, when they hit over 55 billion. By comparison, the company estimated spam texts numbered 88 billion for the entire year of 2021.
Last month, the company reported Americans received 14.3 billion spam texts.
To find out how Milwaukee residents are handling this frustrating increase of spam texts, specifically around real estate, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel asked members of the Milwaukee Reddit how they have responded to spammers; here is what they said:
Money, money, money
Just like you, real estate agents want a good deal, so asking for millions in cash or diamonds probably isn’t even worth countering for them. Here are a few of the outlandish requests that have been made in response:
I tell them SOLD! Stop at the house with a briefcase full of cash! They stop messaging me after that.
Tell them you'll only take $10 million in non-Blood diamonds.
I replied once telling them I required 1.5 million and not a penny less. I haven’t heard from any of them since and I used to get at least one message a week about selling my house.
You don't really want this house, do you?
Some of the people soliciting messages likely wouldn’t mind purchasing a property in need of rehab, but some Milwaukee residents try hard to make their home as unappealing a property as possible:
I send them a pic of (a) house on fire and tell them I'm highly motivated to sell, make me an offer.
My friend gave me a tip. I now respond with "you mean the murder house?"
I’d be a nightmare to deal with, I promise
Some residents have decided rather than making their property unappealing to soliciting buyers, they’d rather just illustrate that they wouldn't exactly be easy to deal with.
One Redditor, for example, even said they even bring them out to their properties and make offers only to back out at the last minute, writing, “I waste as MUCH of their time as possible.”
Here’s how others have handled it:
If it's an actual realtor I take a screenshot of the text and post it with my 1-star Google review of their company.
I told one of them that - when they asked me for the umpteenth time if I was interested in discussing my dad's duplex - that I was interested in them swallowing rat poison while their family watched them do it. I've also tended to reply with "I don't do business with cold callers. Ever."
I always respond with a really really lewd photo ... Then I respond to their questions like nothing happened. I do this for a while repeatedly and they stop messaging me
I just text them that I'm not interested, but since they own properties in the area, I'm looking for places to metal detect.
I tell them I’ll need three goats and two chickens just to hear their offer. Told one once it would cost them their firstborn daughter.
How can I actually stop the messages?
You can’t stop all of them, but you can reduce how many you get.
You can forward the message to 7726 (SPAM), a universal reporting system that alerts carriers of spam and phishing text messages. You can also use text blocker apps, such as SMS Shield, Avast One, TextKiller and Truecaller, which usually require a subscription of some kind. And finally, you can reach out to your phone carrier to see if they offer spam-blocking technology.
For more tips on keeping your data safe, you can check out our earlier reporting on keeping your information private from data brokers.
Talis Shelbourne is an investigative solutions reporter covering the issues of affordable housing and lead poisoning. Have a tip? You can reach Talis at (414) 403-6651 or tshelbourn@jrn.com. Follow her on Twitter at @talisseer and message her on Facebook at @talisseer.
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This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Here's how annoyed Milwaukee residents dealt with spam texts.
