Idaho man scammed by business claiming to be in Fargo

An Idaho man reached out to our Whistle Blower Hotline this morning after flying to Fargo to pick up a motor home he put a down payment on—Only to find out it was all just a scam.

"It's the perfect scam. I thought I had done my due diligence with this. It's not the first time I've bought off the internet, so I don't know what to tell you, but this one needs to be shut down," he said. The Idaho man did not want to be named.

The man says he's now out over $2,000 for the payment, hotel, airfare and taxi fees.

"This is a scam and it's a good one," he said. The Idaho man did not want to be named.

After talking with salesmen from the website used-sas.com for almost a month, he thought he was in the clear and that he would be driving back with this motor home in tow.

"I couldn't find anything wrong with it. With all the communication I was getting through emails and live chat and everything like that I thought, 'Okay, these guys are on the up and up,'" he said.

The man says he put a lot of time and effort into investigating the trustworthiness of the website and camper for sale. He says he even went as far to look up the VIN number listed online. He says everything checked out, so he put a $960 down payment on the camper, and made his way to where the website said their headquarters were.

"By the time I really got wind of maybe there might be something seriously wrong, it was too late. I thought, I might as well come to Fargo and check it out," he said.

The website claimed 3313 Fiechtner Drive in Fargo as their vehicle showroom location. However, when the man came Thursday afternoon to pick up his new motor home there were no motor homes or other vehicles in sight.

"Yeah I was pretty upset with these guys, I sent them on their live chat some pretty nasty notes. I'm just ready to go home. I've had enough," he said.

But he's not the only one. While our reporter was out looking for a car lot or vehicle showroom on Fiechtner Dr., a man pulled up asking about the website and where the business might be located.

"There's not signs, they're not answering emails, not answering their phones or anything," John Okerson said.

Okerson drove to Fargo today from Minneapolis hoping to drive away with the same RV the Idaho man put a payment on.

And businesses next door tell Valley News Live they've talked with at least four other people in the last week looking for the vehicle lot.

"Apparently it was too good to be true," Okerson said.

Okerson says luckily he hadn't paid any money yet and hopes no one else is lured in and scammed.

The Idaho man says because he made the down payment back in his home state, Fargo Police couldn't take a report from him.

He says when he gets back to Boise tonight, he plans to make a police report and file complaints with both the Idaho and North Dakota Attorney General's.