Melissa Walsh said Toronto police assured her family members that it had only happened to them.
Last year, fraudsters nearly sold Ms. Walsh’s great-uncle’s house in east Toronto without her family knowing.
We were told to move on
she says.
However, earlier this month, a Toronto Police Service press release revealed another case where scam artists successfully sold a house before the real owners found out what happened. had passed.
And now it turns out that these two real estate fraud cases are probably just the tip of the iceberg.
CBC Toronto learned that a handful of criminal groups are behind these real estate frauds in which at least 30 homes in the Greater Toronto Area have been sold or mortgaged without the knowledge of the real owners.
These revelations come from a private investigation firm hired by a title insurance company to try to shed light on these frauds which cost insurers millions of dollars in compensation.
It is a very laborious process when trying to figure out who is behind [une fraude]
explains the President and CEO of King International Advisory GroupBrian King.
We are kind of aware of four or five loosely organized groups working in the GTA
he adds.
This company is currently investigating four fraudulent title transfer cases in the Greater Toronto Area, where a property was stolen using identity theft to profit from the sale of the home.
At least 26 other mortgage frauds are also being investigated.
These mortgages were taken on a home without the owner’s consent to obtain the cash value of the mortgage.
other families is hard to understand”,”text”:”To hear that this happened to potentially more than 30 other families is hard to understand””>Learning that it may have happened to more than 30 other families is hard to fathom.
says Melissa Walsh.
I don’t understand why it wasn’t [soulevé plus tôt]
she wonders.
In addition to the four claims Brian King is investigating, three other title insurers, which provide protection in Canada, told CBC Toronto that they had all received claims of cases of fraud in which a homeowner’s house had been sold without their knowledge.
They were unable to provide specific numbers prior to the publication of this article, however.
According to the Senior Vice President of Stewart TitleKaren Decker, her company identified several cases
home sales in the Toronto area where it was not the actual owners.
How does the scheme work?
According to Brian King, criminal groups start by looking in property records – which are publicly available – for a house with no mortgage or with a small mortgage where there is still plenty left. equity
.
The groups that receive the fraudulent funds use stolen IDs and hire substitutes
to pose as tenants in order to gain access to the house.
others substitutes
pretend to be owners to mortgage a house or to sell it.
000 et 10000 dollars to pretend to be the owners”,”text”:”Often it is petty criminals who are paid between 5000 and 10000 dollars to pretend to be the owners””>Often they are petty criminals paid $5,000 to $10,000 to impersonate the owners.
explique M. King.
The people behind the frauds don’t want to be on the front line
he says.
The substitutes
, like this couple wanted by Toronto police, are evenly split between criminal groups, according to King. Everything is done according to the ethnic origin of the owner for whom the substitute
will pass.
Fromhiring
“replacements”, the mortgage or the sale is concluded quickly.
For sales, fake owners often accept the first reasonable offer they receive.
In most of the cases, [ce sont] people who look good; money is usually withdrawn from fraudulent bank accounts within seven days
explique Brian King.
This money is fairly quickly converted either into cryptocurrency before being transferred elsewhere, or into gold bars, and, very often, it is shipped abroad immediately, beyond the reach of the authorities here.
he adds.
CBC Toronto contacted the Toronto Police Service several times for comment, but no one was available to talk about these title fraud cases.
King International Advisory Group President and CEO Brian King says his private investigative firm is aware of “four or five” organized crime groups that commit title fraud in the Greater Toronto Area.
Photo : Radio-Canada / Farrah Merali
According to Mr. King, these cases present a problem for the police since the criminal groups can have several properties moving at the same time in several regions.
police régionaux et municipaux afin [...] que des liens puissent être créés","text":"Dans un monde idéal, nous aurions un moyen de coordonner ces efforts entre les différents services de police régionaux et municipaux afin [...] que des liens puissent être créés"">In an ideal world, we would have a way to coordinate these efforts between the various regional and municipal police departments in order to […] links can be made
he believes.
The company King International Advisory Group attempts to determine where fraudulent funds are being transferred for its clients.
The firm is successful in recovering money in some cases, but often title insurance companies don’t discover the fraud until it’s too late.
The future of title insurance may be in jeopardy
In the majority of cases, the true owner and purchaser are protected from most fraud losses by having title insurance.
This insurance protects homeowners against fraudulent claims on their property. It also pays the legal costs to restore the owner’s property rights.
If a buyer unwittingly buys a home that has been fraudulently listed, the insurance should also protect them. In such cases, the true owner will likely get their home back and the unwitting buyer will get their money back.
With the number of mortgage frauds and title transfers skyrocketing, title insurer John Rider is concerned about the sustainability of providing this long-term coverage.
The senior vice-president of Chicago Title Insurance Company in Canada, John Rider, fears that if the number of mortgage frauds and title frauds continues to grow, insurers will eventually decide to no longer provide this coverage to consumers.
Photo : Radio-Canada / Farrah Merali
We’ve gone from no such complaints to several dozen these days.
says John Rider, Senior Vice President of the Chicago Title Insurance Company in the country.
million, probably more, in fraud claims over the last two and a half years”,”text”:”There are four securities companies in the sector in Canada and we estimate that in the industry as a whole , there’s easily $200million, probably more, in fraud claims over the past two and a half years””>There are four title companies in this sector in Canada and we estimate that industry-wide there has easily been $200 million, probably more, in fraud claims over the past two and a half years
he points out.
The Chicago Title Insurance Company has received over 80 mortgage fraud claims since the end of 2019, primarily from the Greater Toronto and Greater Vancouver area.
The other three title insurers have similar concerns about an increasing number of mortgage frauds and title transfers in recent years.
John Rider wants government intervention that would strengthen identity verification standards for professionals in the real estate industry so that they do not rely solely on IDs for these types of transactions.
With information from John Lancaster, CBC News
