The Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) and the Hous­ing De­vel­op­ment Cor­po­ra­tion (HDC) are warn­ing cit­i­zens about a se­ries of fraud­u­lent schemes tar­get­ing peo­ple seek­ing af­ford­able hous­ing.

In a me­dia re­lease, the TTPS Fraud Squad, work­ing with the HDC, said scam­mers have been im­per­son­at­ing HDC of­fi­cials, ad­ver­tis­ing homes on so­cial me­dia, and de­mand­ing up­front pay­ments from vic­tims.

The HDC said the scams tar­get fam­i­lies hop­ing to se­cure safe and af­ford­able hous­ing. It warned that the Cor­po­ra­tion does not re­quest pay­ments through What­sApp, Gmail, or so­cial me­dia plat­forms. It al­so un­der­scored that all le­git­i­mate trans­ac­tions must take place at its Head Of­fice un­der of­fi­cial pro­ce­dures.