Thanks for all the replies. I have heard nothing more from the scammed renters since last night, I hope they found somewhere for their family (and 2 huge dogs!) to stay.
In my brief conversation with them, they didn’t recall which site they rented from, but said that it was not Craigslist (but who knows? I was a little suspicious they didn’t know, TBH)
They indicated that in addition to all the photos, there was a full rental availability calendar. They also had multiple phone calls with the supposed owner (also less common, usually CL scams attempt to keep you on email at all costs). To me, the biggest red flag they should have noticed was paying by Venmo, rather than paying to an agency (which I believe then holds it in escrow until the rental completes).
I checked 10 popular rental sites plus Craigslist to see if I could find a scam listing, but didn’t turn up anything (I did see one scam-defense post like @winniwannabe described, someone posting their own photo saying “if you see this anywhere on CL, it’s a scam”).
But definitely leaves me on edge, the thought that more victims could be showing up at my door all summer.
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