I don’t know which is scarier, my recent story about pyrrhotite (crumbling foundations) or this real and local scenario, known as property title theft. Home/property title theft is a type of real estate fraud. Although it is uncommon, It occurs when someone steals the title to someone else’s property, and it’s happening locally.
Several months ago I received an email from someone purporting to own, and wanting to sell, a buildable lot in Ashburnham. The ‘seller’ was from out of state and asked me to do the research and send them listing paperwork to sell their land. I frequently have real clients who are out of state who find me online and reach out about selling property. In this case, our communication was all by email, which is a bit of a red flag, because I find that people who become my legitimate out-of-state clients want to get on a phone call to interview before hiring me.
I followed this for a little bit, and it didn’t take long for me to recognize that I know the actual owners of this property. The person who reached out to me used the actual landowner name, but they sure weren’t the people who own the land, who happened to be acquaintances of mine. I wasn’t sure who to reach out to about this I(part of the email exchange is shown below), but I sure let my acquaintances who actually own the land know of the correspondence.
There is a feature on the registry of deeds website that allows people to sign up for alerts on their own property, but as you’ll read in the story below, the horse is already out of the barn at the point that you learn that your property is now owned by someone else. To set up an account to monitor a property, visit this site within the Secretary of State’s website and follow the directions. Although there are 10 counties participating, and Worcester County is one of them, I’m not able to find where the Worcester County North Registry of Deeds is participating specifically through the same page. So, if your property is in Ashburnham, Westminster, Fitchburg, Leominster and Lunenburg, you can sign up for property alerts here.
I’m Facebook friends with a Boston real estate litigation attorney, Rich Vetstein, and have been reading his Mass Real Estate Law Blog posts for years. He goes after the bad guys, and has a history of success getting them.
You’ll see in the story below, and in any additional research you might do, the reviews on title lock services are a mixed bag. If this new scam is becoming more common, it seems there’s got to be a way for people to record a document against their property, so that something would show up in a title search for some way to accurately validate the owner of the property. I encourage you to read the story in the link below, and follow the law blog for future stories.
A Counterfeit South Carolina Driver’s License, Forged Deed, and a UPS Store In Philadelphia: The Anatomy Of A Title Theft Scam
by Rich Vetstein on September 12, 2024
