This woman got her 20 boyfriends to buy her 20 iPhones…and then she sold them and bought a house

We’ve all seen online personality and genius criminal mastermind Joanne the Scammer, the comedy personality and alter-ego of 25-year-old Daytona Beach, FL, resident, Branden Miller. Her “Caucasian” antics and fraud heists are legendary. Well, it seems there’s an IRL Joanne the Scammer who got 20 boyfriends to give her 20 iPhones…and then she sold them to buy a house.

Yep, a post written on popular Chinese blogging platform, the Tian Ya Yi Du forum, under the pseudonym “Proud Qiaoba” revealed how a woman had scammed her way into a brand new house.

As the BBC reports, Proud Qiaoaba is the co-worker of a woman Chinese media have named “Xiaoli” (also not her real name). In the story, Proud Qiaoaba recalls how Xiaoli, who hails from Shenzhen in southern China, asked each of her 20 (!) boyfriends to buy her a brand new iPhone 7.

After receiving the 20 smartphone handsets, Xiaoli then sold the phones on the electronic recycling website Hui Shou Bao for the princely sum of 120,000 Chinese yuan – that’s around $17,720!

After receiving the funds, Xialoi decided that she would buy a house.

Proud Qiaoba recalls how Xialoi then showed all her friends her brand new home, stating in the blog post that they were surprised by how she’d managed to afford the abode.

"Everyone in the office is talking about this now," Proud Qiaoba wrote. "Who knows what her boyfriends think now this news has become public."

Continuing, Proud Qiaoba detailed how Xialoi wasn’t from a wealthy family.

"Her mum is a housewife and her dad is a migrant worker, and she is the oldest daughter," they explained. "Her parents are getting old and she might be under a lot pressure hoping to buy them a house...But it's still unbelievable that she could use this method!"

Okay, so we know what you must be thinking…There’s no WAY this could be true, right?

Well, as The Telegraph claim, the BBC approached the electronic recycling website, Hui Shou Bao, who confirmed that they had received 20 iPhones from a female client, paying around $857 for each handset. However, the website weren’t going to allow the British broadcaster and speak to Xialoi, saying that she had declined to comment.

"[Xialoi's] day-to-day life has been affected (from the local media attention) and she doesn't want the media to continue covering this story," a spokesperson said. "So she has turned down your interview request."

Since being shared, the story of Xiaoli and her “resourcefulness” has had over 30 million comments on the Chinese social network, Weibo.

While some have criticised Xiaoli’s methods, others seem to have seen the humor in it all.

"I can’t even find one boyfriend," one user wrote. "She can actually find 20 boyfriends at the same time and even get them to buy her an iPhone 7. Just want to ask her to teach me such skills."

We’re not sure what to make of this. While we totally respect her scamming mind, it’s a bit of a crappy thing to do to 20 people. However, it is kinda hilarious!