Sorry, folks.

A sign on the side of a Salem building announcing an imminent In-N-Out Burger appears to be a hoax.

But wait, better news could be on the horizon.

IN-N-OUT burger is coming to Salem, Oregon in June!! pic.twitter.com/0cENP1cWpB — ｃａｓｓｉｅ♛ (@Cassiedidion) February 4, 2018

The sign, stapled to plywood outside a building in downtown Salem, is a fake, according to In-N-Out Vice President of Operations Denny Warwick.

This isn't In-N-Out playing coy, either. According to Warwick, the building is "not a site that we are familiar with."

So does that mean there are Salem sites that the company is familiar with?

Indeed it does.

"We have looked at and evaluated a few sites in Salem and the surrounding area but we are still in the very early stages of development and are not yet ready to move forward with a particular location," Warwick says. "We do know that the Salem area is a great community and we do hope to be there in the future but, at this time, it is too early to speculate when or even if we will build a restaurant there."

If In-N-Out did come to Salem, it would become the burger chain's northernmost restaurant, leapfrogging their recent openings in Grants Pass and Medford (pictured above). Oregon's capital is about an hour's drive south of Portland.

-- Michael Russell