Custom Residential Architects Network

Has anyone on this list ever receive a HOUZZ inquiry from a woman by the name of Camile Dipson, camiledipson45@gmail.com? About a week ago, I received an email from this woman looking for someone to stage an apartment for her and her very young family that were moving to the states from London. The request required work to be complete by a very compressed time schedule. In one of her early messages she sent a description and several photos of her family as well as a bunch of catalog cuts of furniture, lighting, window treatments, carpeting, and electronics plus a floor plan of her future home. This message asked for my design fees and the city of my business. She also asked if she could pay me with a certified check. Long story short, the email correspondence I received from her was very disjointed but the payment inquiry was the same. She requested my personal information; "name in full, front door/mailing address in full and a number we could reach me at". She never supplied the address of her future home nor did the floor plan description match what was shown on the floor plan that she attached. This experience was very disconcerting from what is meant to be an online professional community.   I am very disapointed in all of the leads I've received from HOUZZ.

Does anyone have any similar experiences with Houzz?  Does Houzz block deceptive and/or malicious activities?

Thank You,

------------------------------
Kathy Prochnow AIA
Architect
AKAP
Ocean Springs MS
------------------------------

Kathy, that story is very disconcerting - it sounds like a scammer.

Thanks for the warning - I've never heard of somthing like this happening before but it is good to be aware it is out there.

As far as I know, Houzz does not monitor the personal messages sent to people on the site. However, I'm sure they will be responsive if you bring this abuse (assuming it is abuse) to their attention.

Enoch

------------------------------
Enoch Sears AIA
Visalia CA
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 03-04-2017 00:22
From: Kathy Prochnow
Subject: HOUZZ

Has anyone on this list ever receive a HOUZZ inquiry from a woman by the name of Camile Dipson, camiledipson45@gmail.com? About a week ago, I received an email from this woman looking for someone to stage an apartment for her and her very young family that were moving to the states from London. The request required work to be complete by a very compressed time schedule. In one of her early messages she sent a description and several photos of her family as well as a bunch of catalog cuts of furniture, lighting, window treatments, carpeting, and electronics plus a floor plan of her future home. This message asked for my design fees and the city of my business. She also asked if she could pay me with a certified check. Long story short, the email correspondence I received from her was very disjointed but the payment inquiry was the same. She requested my personal information; "name in full, front door/mailing address in full and a number we could reach me at". She never supplied the address of her future home nor did the floor plan description match what was shown on the floor plan that she attached. This experience was very disconcerting from what is meant to be an online professional community.   I am very disapointed in all of the leads I've received from HOUZZ.

Does anyone have any similar experiences with Houzz?  Does Houzz block deceptive and/or malicious activities?

Thank You,

------------------------------
Kathy Prochnow AIA
Architect
AKAP
Ocean Springs MS
------------------------------

Hi Kathy and Enoch,

Yes, I have had a similar experience with HOUZZ.

Last November 6, 2016, I received a text message from a "Wendy Wilson" asking me if I would be interested in an interior design job and saying that she had found me via HOUZZ.

I thought it was suspicious as I had not been active on HOUZZ since 2013, though my profile and portfolio were still there.

And I was shocked that she had found my mobile phone number there.

I replied to her text, asking her to send more details about the project to my professional email address.

She did so via an email account "wendy wilson6666@gmail.com. She claimed her husband had found a lucrative job in Katy, TX and they were relocating from London and needed me to "stage their new apartment." 

I could not find the apartment via a google search and I thought it was odd that someone would want to spend time and money on a mere apartment staging.

I researched and found the name Wendy Lydia Wilson associated with that email address.

I, too, was very upset about the situation but did not feel it was any fault of HOUZZ's. ?

In doing a Google search just now, I came across a blog addressing this new phenomenon of people/scammers targeting home stagers. I'll post a link to it subsequently.

I have screenshots of the texts and emails from "Wendy Wilson" but I hesitate to share in case it might be a violation of "Wendy's" privacy.

Anyhow, I agree, this is disconcerting and bothersome and needs to be addressed.

I will mention it to the HOUZZ rep who contacts me periodically for marketing efforts and let you know what they say.

Thank you for your courage, Kathy, in bringing this topic to everyone's attention so we can be aware of what's going on and take comfort that we were not alone in being what seems like "targeting".

Sincerely yours,

Tara Imani, AIA





------------------------------
Tara Imani AIA, NCIDQ, ASID, CSI
Principal
Tara Imani Designs, LLC
Houston TX
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 03-04-2017 08:49
From: Enoch Sears
Subject: HOUZZ

Kathy, that story is very disconcerting - it sounds like a scammer.

Thanks for the warning - I've never heard of somthing like this happening before but it is good to be aware it is out there.

As far as I know, Houzz does not monitor the personal messages sent to people on the site. However, I'm sure they will be responsive if you bring this abuse (assuming it is abuse) to their attention.

Enoch

------------------------------
Enoch Sears AIA
Visalia CA
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 03-04-2017 00:22
From: Kathy Prochnow
Subject: HOUZZ

Has anyone on this list ever receive a HOUZZ inquiry from a woman by the name of Camile Dipson, camiledipson45@gmail.com? About a week ago, I received an email from this woman looking for someone to stage an apartment for her and her very young family that were moving to the states from London. The request required work to be complete by a very compressed time schedule. In one of her early messages she sent a description and several photos of her family as well as a bunch of catalog cuts of furniture, lighting, window treatments, carpeting, and electronics plus a floor plan of her future home. This message asked for my design fees and the city of my business. She also asked if she could pay me with a certified check. Long story short, the email correspondence I received from her was very disjointed but the payment inquiry was the same. She requested my personal information; "name in full, front door/mailing address in full and a number we could reach me at". She never supplied the address of her future home nor did the floor plan description match what was shown on the floor plan that she attached. This experience was very disconcerting from what is meant to be an online professional community.   I am very disapointed in all of the leads I've received from HOUZZ.

Does anyone have any similar experiences with Houzz?  Does Houzz block deceptive and/or malicious activities?

Thank You,

------------------------------
Kathy Prochnow AIA
Architect
AKAP
Ocean Springs MS
------------------------------

As mentioned in my previous response to Kathy Prochnow, AIA, NCARB, NCIDQ, here is a link to the blog post on the new problem of scammers targeting interior designers/home stagers:

Email scam targets home stagers

If you read the 69 comments, you'll see others who have had similar experiences with people using other aliases and as recent as 2/8/2017.

Email scam targets home stagers

Home Staging Business Report		remove preview
Email scam targets home stagers In case you were still wondering how many people have heard of home staging, here's further proof that this is a well established field. It seems the scam artists are starting to crawl out from under their rocks to see if they can con home stagers into sending them money! View this on Home Staging Business Report >

------------------------------
Tara Imani AIA
Principal
Tara Imani Designs, LLC
Houston TX
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 03-04-2017 08:49
From: Enoch Sears
Subject: HOUZZ

Kathy, that story is very disconcerting - it sounds like a scammer.

Thanks for the warning - I've never heard of somthing like this happening before but it is good to be aware it is out there.

As far as I know, Houzz does not monitor the personal messages sent to people on the site. However, I'm sure they will be responsive if you bring this abuse (assuming it is abuse) to their attention.

Enoch

------------------------------
Enoch Sears AIA
Visalia CA
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 03-04-2017 00:22
From: Kathy Prochnow
Subject: HOUZZ

Has anyone on this list ever receive a HOUZZ inquiry from a woman by the name of Camile Dipson, camiledipson45@gmail.com? About a week ago, I received an email from this woman looking for someone to stage an apartment for her and her very young family that were moving to the states from London. The request required work to be complete by a very compressed time schedule. In one of her early messages she sent a description and several photos of her family as well as a bunch of catalog cuts of furniture, lighting, window treatments, carpeting, and electronics plus a floor plan of her future home. This message asked for my design fees and the city of my business. She also asked if she could pay me with a certified check. Long story short, the email correspondence I received from her was very disjointed but the payment inquiry was the same. She requested my personal information; "name in full, front door/mailing address in full and a number we could reach me at". She never supplied the address of her future home nor did the floor plan description match what was shown on the floor plan that she attached. This experience was very disconcerting from what is meant to be an online professional community.   I am very disapointed in all of the leads I've received from HOUZZ.

Does anyone have any similar experiences with Houzz?  Does Houzz block deceptive and/or malicious activities?

Thank You,

------------------------------
Kathy Prochnow AIA
Architect
AKAP
Ocean Springs MS
------------------------------

Tara, Enoch -

Thanks for the replies and for the scammer link.  Many of the posted messages match, even down to the exact wording, to the email inquiry I received from HOUZZ.  With this experience, I have lost my trust in HOUZZ for being a viable source for my business.   If HOUZZ is unable to filter out this kind of malicious activity from happening, what good are they.  I am very disappointed that I wasted my time on such a scam.  This reassures me that the best clients are found at the local level and not online though social media.

------------------------------
Kathy Prochnow AIA
Architect
AKAP
Ocean Springs MS
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 03-04-2017 15:50
From: Tara Imani
Subject: HOUZZ

As mentioned in my previous response to Kathy Prochnow, AIA, NCARB, NCIDQ, here is a link to the blog post on the new problem of scammers targeting interior designers/home stagers:

Email scam targets home stagers

If you read the 69 comments, you'll see others who have had similar experiences with people using other aliases and as recent as 2/8/2017.

Email scam targets home stagers

Home Staging Business Report		remove preview
Email scam targets home stagers In case you were still wondering how many people have heard of home staging, here's further proof that this is a well established field. It seems the scam artists are starting to crawl out from under their rocks to see if they can con home stagers into sending them money! View this on Home Staging Business Report >

------------------------------
Tara Imani AIA
Principal
Tara Imani Designs, LLC
Houston TX
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 03-04-2017 08:49
From: Enoch Sears
Subject: HOUZZ

Kathy, that story is very disconcerting - it sounds like a scammer.

Thanks for the warning - I've never heard of somthing like this happening before but it is good to be aware it is out there.

As far as I know, Houzz does not monitor the personal messages sent to people on the site. However, I'm sure they will be responsive if you bring this abuse (assuming it is abuse) to their attention.

Enoch

------------------------------
Enoch Sears AIA
Visalia CA
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 03-04-2017 00:22
From: Kathy Prochnow
Subject: HOUZZ

Has anyone on this list ever receive a HOUZZ inquiry from a woman by the name of Camile Dipson, camiledipson45@gmail.com? About a week ago, I received an email from this woman looking for someone to stage an apartment for her and her very young family that were moving to the states from London. The request required work to be complete by a very compressed time schedule. In one of her early messages she sent a description and several photos of her family as well as a bunch of catalog cuts of furniture, lighting, window treatments, carpeting, and electronics plus a floor plan of her future home. This message asked for my design fees and the city of my business. She also asked if she could pay me with a certified check. Long story short, the email correspondence I received from her was very disjointed but the payment inquiry was the same. She requested my personal information; "name in full, front door/mailing address in full and a number we could reach me at". She never supplied the address of her future home nor did the floor plan description match what was shown on the floor plan that she attached. This experience was very disconcerting from what is meant to be an online professional community.   I am very disapointed in all of the leads I've received from HOUZZ.

Does anyone have any similar experiences with Houzz?  Does Houzz block deceptive and/or malicious activities?

Thank You,

------------------------------
Kathy Prochnow AIA
Architect
AKAP
Ocean Springs MS
------------------------------

Kathy,

I completely agree with your assessment. I'd like to take it a step further and call HOUZZ what it is: thinly-veiled usury of the talents and magnanimity of interior designers and architects to become yet another "Joss & Main" or "Wayfair"- an online retailer- to the sole benefit of themselves at the expense of our industry's beneficence.

For example, they draw us in by encouraging lay people to pose their most difficult design dilemmas- and who among us can resist solving a design problem?! Not me, on many occasions. Only, this is for free, at the expense of our time, effort, focus- further diluting our industry's integrity and professionalism.

Secondly, they have created the nebulous "Best of HOUZZ 2016" (or any year)-- based on the online efforts of any designer who takes the time to post good pics of their work and garner online reviews and recommendations from clients and others. This, too, draws us in and yet offers no return on investment; a sheer exercise in futility.

Thirdly, HOUZZ reps send us (this has been my experience) countless requests via email to "set up your preferred profile" or "learn how HOUZZ can help you find clients." (loosely paraphrased.

I have been reticent to take advantage of these email offers or to even speak with a rep because I've heard nothing but "sob stories" from other innocent interior designers, one of which said - in a continuing education seminar- that she "spent $3,000.00 on ads with HOUZZ and received zero ROI."

It concerns me that the AIA leadership would align our professional organization with a company that seemingly has no intention of helping our members -- but have primarily succeeded in profiting by pilfering off of our free services and time wasted online to build their website with our 'holographic' landing pages.

If anyone has had a good experience with HOUZZ, I would like to hear about it.

Thank you,



Tara Imani, AIA, NCIDQ, ASID, CSI
Registered Architect + Interior Designer

Tara Imani Designs, LLC
10333 Richmond Avenue, Suite 170
Houston, TX 77042

Work/Mobile Ph: 832-723-1798

www.taraimanidesigns.com


Original Message------

Tara, Enoch -

Thanks for the replies and for the scammer link.  Many of the posted messages match, even down to the exact wording, to the email inquiry I received from HOUZZ.  With this experience, I have lost my trust in HOUZZ for being a viable source for my business.   If HOUZZ is unable to filter out this kind of malicious activity from happening, what good are they.  I am very disappointed that I wasted my time on such a scam.  This reassures me that the best clients are found at the local level and not online though social media.

------------------------------
Kathy Prochnow AIA
Architect
AKAP
Ocean Springs MS
------------------------------

I am responding in defense of Houzz which has been the most lucrative marketing platform for my office over the past several years.  My practice is in an affluent, suburban Maryland county just outside of DC and at least 90% of my clients are at minimum, casual users of Houzz.  I would also say that 15 to 20% of my homeowner clients have found me on Houzz and contact me after viewing my site and reading my reviews.  These clients then create and share their "Ideabooks"  with me which is extremely useful in understanding their ideas and what makes them generally feel good.

My Houzz rep contacts me once a month to review how the site is working, makes recommendations, reviews my dashboard and informs me on what new features are available on the platform.  She does an awesome job for me.

Although I have not had a malicious contact through Houzz, We all deal with similar scams through email, through our websites and through calls to our offices,  Obviously, we all need to be aware of these predators but we cannot blame Houzz.  They are not only good for us an individuals but they are a good supporter of CRAN.  

------------------------------
John Lehman AIA
Lehman Associates, PC
Highland MD
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 03-05-2017 14:51
From: Tara Imani
Subject: HOUZZ

Kathy,

I completely agree with your assessment. I'd like to take it a step further and call HOUZZ what it is: thinly-veiled usury of the talents and magnanimity of interior designers and architects to become yet another "Joss & Main" or "Wayfair"- an online retailer- to the sole benefit of themselves at the expense of our industry's beneficence.

For example, they draw us in by encouraging lay people to pose their most difficult design dilemmas- and who among us can resist solving a design problem?! Not me, on many occasions. Only, this is for free, at the expense of our time, effort, focus- further diluting our industry's integrity and professionalism.

Secondly, they have created the nebulous "Best of HOUZZ 2016" (or any year)-- based on the online efforts of any designer who takes the time to post good pics of their work and garner online reviews and recommendations from clients and others. This, too, draws us in and yet offers no return on investment; a sheer exercise in futility.

Thirdly, HOUZZ reps send us (this has been my experience) countless requests via email to "set up your preferred profile" or "learn how HOUZZ can help you find clients." (loosely paraphrased.

I have been reticent to take advantage of these email offers or to even speak with a rep because I've heard nothing but "sob stories" from other innocent interior designers, one of which said - in a continuing education seminar- that she "spent $3,000.00 on ads with HOUZZ and received zero ROI."

It concerns me that the AIA leadership would align our professional organization with a company that seemingly has no intention of helping our members -- but have primarily succeeded in profiting by pilfering off of our free services and time wasted online to build their website with our 'holographic' landing pages.

If anyone has had a good experience with HOUZZ, I would like to hear about it.

Thank you,



Tara Imani, AIA, NCIDQ, ASID, CSI
Registered Architect + Interior Designer

Tara Imani Designs, LLC
10333 Richmond Avenue, Suite 170
Houston, TX 77042

Work/Mobile Ph: 832-723-1798

www.taraimanidesigns.com

I agree with John.  I am one of the early adopters of Houzz.  It has been the most effective marketing for my firm than print advertising and other social media.  I have gotten several jobs in areas outside of my normal practice area.  I've even been told from clients they hired me because I was very responsive to questions asked of me on Houzz.  One thing that did bother me was people asking what color a room was painted.  My Houzz representative informed me to tag the color so they won't bother you.  But I still put a disclaimer that particular color can look totally different based on tree cover, orientation, etc.

I also use it with clients.  They can search the site and send me idea books which are very helpful when designing custom homes.


------------------------------
Christopher Rose AIA, ASID
President
Christopher Rose Architects, P.A.
Johns Island SC
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 03-06-2017 08:48
From: John Lehman
Subject: HOUZZ

I am responding in defense of Houzz which has been the most lucrative marketing platform for my office over the past several years.  My practice is in an affluent, suburban Maryland county just outside of DC and at least 90% of my clients are at minimum, casual users of Houzz.  I would also say that 15 to 20% of my homeowner clients have found me on Houzz and contact me after viewing my site and reading my reviews.  These clients then create and share their "Ideabooks"  with me which is extremely useful in understanding their ideas and what makes them generally feel good.

My Houzz rep contacts me once a month to review how the site is working, makes recommendations, reviews my dashboard and informs me on what new features are available on the platform.  She does an awesome job for me.

Although I have not had a malicious contact through Houzz, We all deal with similar scams through email, through our websites and through calls to our offices,  Obviously, we all need to be aware of these predators but we cannot blame Houzz.  They are not only good for us an individuals but they are a good supporter of CRAN.  

------------------------------
John Lehman AIA
Lehman Associates, PC
Highland MD
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 03-05-2017 14:51
From: Tara Imani
Subject: HOUZZ

Kathy,

I completely agree with your assessment. I'd like to take it a step further and call HOUZZ what it is: thinly-veiled usury of the talents and magnanimity of interior designers and architects to become yet another "Joss & Main" or "Wayfair"- an online retail