Someone want to buy us a house

LilacButterfly95

LilacButterfly95 said:

Grumpy_chap said:

LilacButterfly95 said:

we found his linked in profile which matches everything his saying the photo is him showing on it and the company website shows that he is the owner with picture of him and staff, it appears there are only a few staff members.. 

Oh, that's good.
I assume you can also look into all the other philanthropic acts this man has done - he is a marketing magnate after all so will want to capitalise the value of such benevolence.
Does the company data support a multi-millionaire marketing magnate?

I’m really sorry I’m not sure what you mean by marketing magnate?

Ovbiously I’ve never experienced anything like this but when researching him and the company there is always links with photographs of his as the president and ceo of this company.. all social media accounts for this company has many photographs of him. When searching the company it says it has 7 employees including himself which is what he’s also told us and they all go to different places around the world for clients. A few websites have said the companies annual revenue is $4.7million USD 

LilacButterfly95

Not really sure how to check charity donations.. however looking through the social media of the company it seems to support and promote a few different children’s charities? 

MalMonroe

LilacButterfly95 said:

My partner has a friend he hasn’t known for very long however they get along very well had a few nights out together just a typical bromance anyway, one night they got to talking about work ect, the guy asked my partner his dream jobs ect as he worked in the army and missed the opportunity to get a trade and is now stuck in an office job, renting an over priced mould ridden 1bedroomed flat. Now based on that concersation my partners friend asked to meet him one afternoon and not only offered him £20,000 to learn a trade and start a business he has also offered to purchase him a £145,000 2 bedroomed house and put it in my partners name! We obviously rejected this and said there’s no way we could accept this generous offer.. turns out after a few google searches the guy is a multi millionaire in America who owns a million dollar business.. the guy has continued to offer to help us out and when we’ve asked why he’s doing it he simply said my life has revolved around my work so much I haven’t had a chance to have my own family life I have no one to spend the money on so if I can help a struggling family make ends meet and have the life they deserve then why shouldn’t I? 

Are we stupid to reject it? Their friendship has nothing to do with the money! But at the same time are we horrible people if we accept? I don’t know if my conscience would ever get over the fact this guy restarted and built our lives I don’t know if that’s something I can carry with me for the rest of my life!!

To everything this guy has offered, I would say 'thanks very much but no thanks'. Call me cynical but I have just finished reading a book called 'Psychopath' by Mary Turner Thomson - a Scottish woman who unwittingly got tangled up with and married a brilliantly clever American conman by the name of William Allen Jordan. She was conned out of thousands of pounds. He's also conned many other people out of thousands of pounds by simply being a smooth talker. He's been in jail for being a bigamist but is now out of jail and up to his old tricks - that is tricking folk. Google him, he's on t'internet.
 
Con artists, whether men or women, have the ability to construct realistic web pages that appear to back up everything they say. It's easy when you know how. It's easy to set up a LinkedIn page, too, I have one of my own. I could easily have lied on that page - there is nothing to stop people putting anything they wish on their own page, including photos. (Ever heard of Photoshop?) I've never been asked to verify any of the information (which is true) on my LinkedIn page. 

I just don't think anything good can come of this - that old saying, "if something seems too good to be true, it usually is" seems particularly relevant here. Accept his money and his house and you will be forever beholden to him. He could easily turn nasty, you haven't known him long and you don't know where he has come from. He could well be a philanthropist but it all seems quite fishy. 

Also, why isn't he offering to help people in his own country? There are millions of folk in the US who would benefit from his philanthropy. And as others have said, how come he's been managing to travel all over the world during a pandemic? The majority of business folk don't need to travel half as much now there's Zoom. 

I'd also add please don't let this person know where you live or where your partner lives.

By the way, if your partner's flat really is so bad, he needs to get onto his landlord because he does have some legal rights as a tenant, see this government link -  https://www.gov.uk/private-renting

You are not stupid to reject anything this person offers your partner. But I do think it would be very unwise to accept anything at all from him. You will never get rid of him. 

[P.S. A marketing magnate is a wealthy businessperson. Just google it!]

FaceHead

Agree with the consensus that there's a >50% chance it's a scam. I'd however want to play along with it if only to understand it for my own curiosity (and that of MSE forumites).

No scam starts with the watertight gifting of £150k+ however. If they did ever make an unreasonable demand of you after that (e.g. be a drug mule) you'd just sell up end all contact and disappear into the wind with their £150k.

justwhat

Why can't there be people out there like this? The more money you have the less important it is, in some ways. Some peoples idea of petty cash is another persons lifetime income.

Take what's offered  and be happy. If the guy is exactly what is written on the tin go via a solicitor, the guy will not mind.

Queen_of_the_Hive

Its an interesting proposition and a difficult one to decide what to do.

Thinking a bit out of the box - would you feel more comfortable if the property is put into some kind of trust so that you could live there and if you do move out the property then goes to help another family. Maybe link up with a children's hospice or hospital or something like that who would manage it after you move on. So that you benefit from living there now but it will then benefit others in the future. 

Not every wealthy person is dodgy - they may be lonely and just want to feel good for doing some good, yes there is some risk but maybe genuine too.  

As someone else suggested maybe don't rush into your decision but take the gift of time and get to know the person a bit better before making up your mind what you'll do.

DayDreamerandGeneralWaster

He might be a criminal trying to hide money. Sorry but if it's too good to be true it probably is.

I would be tempted to report this, the guy might be on a wanted list if he's this sophisticated. Just remember that scammers prey on vulnerable people and whilst you might not consider yourselves vulnerable this guy is playing on your weaknesses.

LilacButterfly95

justwhat said:

Why can't there be people out there like this? The more money you have the less important it is, in some ways. Some peoples idea of petty cash is another persons lifetime income.

Take what's offered  and be happy. If the guy is exactly what is written on the tin go via a solicitor, the guy will not mind.

More of an update as my partner met his for another drink last night after work, the guy seems to of opened up more about his reasonings.. 

1. he sees the potential in my partner as they were talking about work and what he would do (way before he was offered the money) and he saw the passion in him.

2. The guy opened up about being genuinely lonely due to his work travelling back and forth all the time - my partner said he doesn’t need to buy his friendship and that he enjoyed his company each time they met before he ever found out he had money to him.

3. The guy opened up further telling him that he’s recently fallen out with a lot of his family members in the US and the past few months he’s been in a very low state of mind and even thought to end everything, but since meeting my partner and seeing the friendship grow and someone wants to be around him not just for the money made him want to help him.

LilacButterfly95

DayDreamerandGeneralWaster said:

He might be a criminal trying to hide money. Sorry but if it's too good to be true it probably is.

I would be tempted to report this, the guy might be on a wanted list if he's this sophisticated. Just remember that scammers prey on vulnerable people and whilst you might not consider yourselves vulnerable this guy is playing on your weaknesses.

His name is everywhere on the internet when you search it? With pictures on him, he also has a travel blog aswel.. which he posts on daily and has posted pictures of where he currently is at the moment? Surely if he was on a wanted list he wouldn’t do stuff like this?

Grumpy_chap

LilacButterfly95 said:

I’m really sorry I’m not sure what you mean by marketing magnate?

I'm sorry or the confusion.
You yourself said:

LilacButterfly95 said:

his company is marketing communications.. which we’ve found all the details of and it’s all legit.. 

Hopefully that covers the "marketing" part and:

LilacButterfly95 said:

the guy is a multi millionaire in America who owns a million dollar business.

Which covers the "magnate" part:
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/magnate

It is good you are able to see the details of the individual and the business in America although, as Mal said, anyone can create an online profile and a snazzy website.  Can you verify the data through the US equivalent of Companies House (I think registrations may be at individual State level) and / or the credit agencies such as D&B?