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Lesson 4 of 6
Money · Guided lesson

Screen job, rental, and opportunity scams

Verify offers that target urgent needs for work, housing, income, education, or investment.

About 35 minutes Finish with a concrete deliverable
Federal Trade CommissionMy Action Plan to Avoid ScamsYouTube
Course primer

My Action Plan to Avoid Scams

From Federal Trade Commission. Watch here or open it on YouTube .

During the course primer, listen for ideas that change how you approach “Screen job, rental, and opportunity scams.” Pause once to capture a useful point, then apply it while producing a combined job, rental, and opportunity screen applied to three fictional offers with source trail and decision.
Before you begin

What this lesson is really solving.

Verify offers that target urgent needs for work, housing, income, education, or investment. This is lesson 4 because later decisions depend on a combined job, rental, and opportunity screen applied to three fictional offers with source trail and decision. A desirable opportunity deserves more verification, not less. Use your own numbers, files, environment, and constraints so the result survives outside the course.

Why this works

Understand the idea before touching the steps.

A desirable opportunity deserves more verification, not less.

Do this

Follow these steps in order.

Take the action in each step; then use the deliverable below to prove the lesson is finished.

  1. 1

    For jobs, verify the employer and recruiter independently, inspect the hiring process, and reject payment, reshipping, check-deposit, account-use, or vague task-income schemes.

  2. 2

    For rentals, confirm the property and authorized representative, compare copied listings, tour safely, read the agreement, and refuse unverifiable upfront payment.

  3. 3

    For investments, training, prizes, and business offers, check registration, written terms, realistic risk, refund rules, complaints, and guarantees with official sources.

Worked example

See the standard in context.

Morgan searches the employer's actual careers page and learns that the text-only interview and equipment check are fraudulent. The learner saves a combined job, rental, and opportunity screen applied to three fictional offers with source trail and decision and notes the evidence or assumption behind the choice so it can be reviewed and improved later.

Quality check

Inspect before you move on.

  • The finished work visibly includes a combined job, rental, and opportunity screen applied to three fictional offers with source trail and decision.
  • You tested the work against this common failure: Lowering standards because you urgently need the job, home, return, credential, or prize the scam promises.
  • Another person could verify this mastery standard: You can verify the organization, transaction, and written terms independently and stop when any essential proof is missing.
Make it real

Your deliverable

A combined job, rental, and opportunity screen applied to three fictional offers with source trail and decision.

Common mistake

Watch for this

Lowering standards because you urgently need the job, home, return, credential, or prize the scam promises.

You’re ready when

Prove it—don’t just recognize it.

You can verify the organization, transaction, and written terms independently and stop when any essential proof is missing.

Objective evidence · 3 questions

Quick knowledge check

Answer from the lesson—not from confidence alone. Score at least 2 of 3 to unlock completion.

Not yet passed

This curriculum-aligned check is scored automatically and stored with your account when signed in. It is an objective learning signal, but it has not yet been independently validated as a standardized assessment.

1Which action belongs in the recommended process for “Screen job, rental, and opportunity scams”?
2Which result is the clearest evidence that this lesson’s work is complete?
3Which choice matches the failure this lesson specifically warns against?
0 of 3 answeredEach question measures the action, evidence, or failure condition taught above.
Useful for this course

Tools, templates, and references

The Life Starter toolkitReusable planners and trackers for practical projects.
Check current detailsReferences reviewed September 9, 2026. Lesson exercises are editorial synthesis; official rules come from the linked sources.
Federal Trade Commission — How to avoid a scamFederal Trade Commission — Job scamsIdentityTheft.gov — Recovery plan
4
One check remains

Pass the knowledge check above first.

Completion unlocks after a score of 2 out of 3. Then confirm that you produced the lesson deliverable.

Go to the knowledge check