A mum has been left horrified after a landlord offered discounted rent in exchange for breast pictures for his ‘modelling business’.
Georgia Linehan, from Canterbury, vowed to never use Gumtree for house hunting ever again as she shared the awkward exchange on Twitter.
The screenshot reveals a WhatsApp conversation in which Georgia is discussing the details of possible house rental in Whitstable, Kent, for herself and her family.
But after telling the man she’d need to have a couple of days to think about it, he came back to her with a suggestion as to how she could save some money on rent.
‘There’s an option to reduce rent if you wanted to,’ he told her.
After Georgia asked how, he said:
I own a modelling company, a few of my tenants work for me doing boob work, so basically breast pictures. For two pictures, the rent gets reduced by £200.
Georgia shared the exchange on Twitter and vowed never to use GumTree to try and find a house again.
She later added:
All jokes aside I think this is a very clear indication of how dangerous some people can be on the internet… especially to young, vulnerable women.
And it also shows how hard it is for a woman to even find a place to live without being sexualised and exploited. Be safe girls.
After sharing the alarming conversation, Georgia was inundated with replies from people branding the landlord ‘disgusting’.
While others responded to tell the mum she was ‘mad for not taking his deal’, she was quick to point out there’s a very good chance the man didn’t even own the property in in the first place.
The post was shared by Rosie Duffield, Member of Parliament for Whitstable, who said:
Whoever you are, this is not okay. ‘Boob work’ [sick emoji].
As you are so close, why don’t you just get in the sea?
As per KentOnline, the property in the photograph is a terraced house listed online with an asking price of £375,000.
A Gumtree spokesperson told UNILAD:
Gumtree is committed to keeping the platform as safe as possible and this activity is a breach of our policy. We strongly encourage our users to report this type of behaviour so our dedicated safety team can investigate and take appropriate actions such as removing adverts and blocking offending users, like this advertiser, from the site.
We also urge our users to communicate via the app rather than other methods, as this makes it easier for us to take action. We provide comprehensive safety advice for prospective tenants on our website and we continue to invest in our platform as well as work closely with government and law enforcement agencies to make Gumtree a safe place to operate.
Sadly, Georgia’s isn’t the first story like this in the area. Canterbury landlords made the headlines last year after it was revealed some were offering skint students cheap rent in exchange for sex.
Fortunately, it seems as though Georgia didn’t even bother to respond to the anonymous ‘landlord’.
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Emma Rosemurgey is an NCTJ trained Journalist who started her career by producing The Royal Rosemurgey newspaper in 2004, which kept her family up to date with the goings on of her sleepy north east village. She graduated from the University of Central Lancashire in Preston and started her career in regional newspapers before joining Tyla (formerly Pretty 52) in 2017, and progressing onto UNILAD in 2019.