According to a recent CertifID survey of U.S. consumers who bought and sold property within the past three years, one in ten consumers is a regular target for real estate wire fraud. One in twenty of those surveyed were victimized.
Real estate is among the few remaining industries without an established, secure process for safeguarding payments. That means your client’s money could be at risk if you aren’t using a reputable, secure entity to protect it.
As technology advances, the threat of fraud is even more acute. Sometimes all a hacker needs is to send an email, text or phone call purporting to be the buyer, seller, real estate agent or title company and instruct the victim to change banking details or make an immediate payment. Buyers and sellers may be vulnerable due to the complexity of transactions, not knowing how the process should work, and having so many different parties involved.
Who is Responsible When a Loss Occurs?
While buyers are responsible for initiating and sending funds for their closing, the real estate industry has a duty to educate them about the risks of wire fraud, what to watch out for and how to protect their savings from being diverted to a scammer.
Buyers, sellers, real estate agents, title companies and mortgage lenders all need to do more to proactively safeguard real estate transactions through education, enhanced processes and technology.
Innovative Technology Keeps Funds Safe
At Sun Title, we use CertifID verification software to identify and prevent suspected fraud during real estate transactions. In 2023 alone, CertifID protected $107B worth of real estate transactions and identified over $2B in suspected fraud — a 56% year-over-year increase. CertifID was created by the owners of Sun Title after they experienced a wire fraud incident in 2015. Since then, it has become the nation’s leading provider of wire fraud protection, insurance and recovery services for title companies, attorneys and others involved in real estate transactions.
To learn more about wire fraud, download CertifID’s 2024 State of Wire Fraud Report.
For more information on protection from wire fraud, visit www.suntitle.com or email: YesTeam@suntitle.com
