From KTVT:

Summertime is a good time for yard sales. But if you are trying to make a few bucks off your unwanted stuff, be careful of whom you are taking money from, because you could be getting ripped off.

After a long weekend, Brandy Smith wrapped up her yard sale Saturday night. She said she sold a lot of her old goods to get some money for a vacation. Friday, Smith had a customer buy a ladder from her.

“We agreed to take a hundred for it. He pulled out a hundred dollar bill and we took one earlier and didn’t think anything of it. went on with the day,” Smith said.

Then, on Saturday morning, Smith pulled out her newspaper and noticed something in the editorial section.

“Someone wrote an editorial saying for the fake $100 bill at my garage sale, shame on you. I kind of laughed it off.”

Smith started thinking about it and decided to take the hundred-dollar bill to her bank. The teller told her it was a fake because even though it passed the pen test, it failed the watermark test. The teller also explained how the bill was made, and why there was an Abraham Lincoln watermark instead of Benjamin Franklin.

“They bleached a five dollar bill and printed a hundred dollar over it. It would easily pass for a true bill unless you knew what water mark to look for,” said Smith.

We found the woman who wrote the article Smith read. Megan Wooten told us she had a bad feeling as soon as she got her hundred dollar bill.

“Gave me a hundred dollar bill. Kind of thought it felt funny, but I was like I don’t know, I don’t want to create a scene,” said Wooten.

Now both women want homeowners to be aware.

Wooten said “I wanted people know there’s someone out there, probably hitting all the garage sales, stealing us blind, it’s not right.”

Remember to look for the watermark. Just hold it up to the light and make sure it’s the right person on the bill.