Realtor Kathy Birchen got an interesting phone call on Easter Sunday from the owners of house she's put on the market.

"I got a call from them that someone had gone to the property saying she was responding to an ad on Craig's List of a house for rent," Birchen, an associate broker Tomie Raines, said.

The only problem? The house is not for rent, and Birchen didn't put any ad on Craig's List. She believes scammers found the information from another Web site.

"They can take it then copy and paste and put up their own ad and Craigs List," she said.

The ad has been since taken down, but News Ten got a copy of the emails sent from the so-called renters to a local woman. In it, they claim to be a couple doing charity work abroad, which is why they need to rent their house. Then it asks for personal information and a deposit.

"$600 for rent, then $400 for a security deposit," Birchen says of the online application. "Then they told the potential tenant she could not get into the place, she could only drive by."

A tell-tale sign it's a scam, she said is if they ask for up-front money and personal information, before you even can see the inside of the house.

"If they ask for that money up-front, you know it doesn't work that way," Birchen said.

Birchen said this is the first Craig's List scam she's encountered, but the National Association of Realtors has warned its members of this sort of thing.

In this case, the possible tenant did the right thing and checked up on the information.

"This one was plain and simple," Birchen said. "It's important for the renters and the owners out there to be aware of this."

Birchen reported the scam to the Eaton County Sheriff's Office, who forwarded it to the Attorney General.

News Ten e-mailed the person who posted the ad on Craigs list, but we haven't gotten a response.