Being a foreigner, last year I wanted to rent an apartment and found a two-bedroom one on Maltapark. I paid €575 in advance to the agent (name supplied) who promised to hand over the keys in a month’s time. After a month, I kept calling him but he did not reply, though, after some time, he responded to a friend of mine, saying he was not authorised by the Malta Tourism Authority to rent the property and, therefore, he returned the money.

I then found another two-bedroom apartment in Birkirkara, also on Maltapark, the rent being €600. When I contacted the agent, I found out it was the same person as in the first case. Being the fool that I am, I trusted him but, again, I kept calling him every day and he either did not answer or else he would give me an appointment to meet but never turned up.

I plan to report the matter to the police because I suspect I am dealing with a fraudster. It seems this same person had pleaded guilty to the same scam about two years ago.