Jesse Scheckner
Title theft, or deed fraud, is a growing problem in Florida and nationwide. It’s the criminal practice of forging documents to steal another person’s home or other real estate property. State lawmakers recently added safeguards to help prevent it, but experts say they’re not enough.
Today, homeowners and deed holders of other real estate properties can register for free property alerts to shield themselves from fraud. The optional services notify subscribers by email, text or phone call about potential property fraud, including when their name is used in a deed, mortgage or other official record without their consent.
It’s an important barrier to “one of the fastest growing crimes in the United States,” said Orange County Clerk Tiffany Moore Russell, President of the Florida Court Clerks & Comptrollers.
“(As) Clerks in Florida, we see firsthand the frustration and damage it can cause for unsuspecting residents.”
A Google search of the issue results in a multitude of troubling stories. Good Morning America detailed one such case: A pair of Hillsborough County thieves stole three homes from unsuspecting owners using quit claim deeds, which are legal documents often used in divorce proceedings or family property transfers that can quickly move property ownership from one person to another.
“They use online information to forge signatures on these deeds and then file them with the Clerk of Court,” Hillsborough County Assistant State Attorney Michael Lennon told the program. “We’ve seen a big increase in that sort of activity.”
The owners of one of the homes, Dreama and Larry Bilby, ended up fighting for a year to regain their property.
Security footage had caught the scammers at the Bilbys’ home, and worried that they might be the target of a con, the Bilbys signed up for property fraud alerts through the Clerk’s Office. They got word within days that their deed had indeed been changed.
The culprits, who were also caught on video at the Clerk’s Office, have since been arrested.
Former Hillsborough Clerk Cindy Stuart told WUSF that while Florida homeowners need to sign up for alerts through their respective Clerk’s Offices, additional legislative action is warranted to fix the issue.
Quit claim deeds, she said, “require very little information” and are therefore relatively susceptible to criminal misuse.
Lennon noted that there are “no real safeguards in place other than the notification system.”
Since the unanimous passage of HB 1419 in 2023, Florida law has required every county Clerk to provide a free service notifying property owners when their deed has been changed. The alerts come within 24 hours, and due to follow-up legislation passed last year, the personal information of those who register for the service is shielded from public view.
Property owners who don’t sign up for the service may not learn of a change in their deed until their next tax notice arrives at the beginning or end of the year. And there’s nothing to stop the initial fraudulent act from happening.
There’s more. When a scam artist succeeds in stealing a property, fooling a realtor into facilitating a sale is “incredibly easy” thanks to an overwhelming reliance on digital commerce and documentation, Fort Myers realtor Maria Trestman told Florida Politics.
Trestman contacted her local realtors’ board, multiple listing service (MLS), Property Appraiser and Clerk’s Offices to share the story of an elderly couple whom she was helping to navigate fraud trouble. The result: “Everyone pointed fingers at each other, unwilling to take regulatory responsibility.”
The bottom line, she said, is more legislative action is needed.
She said Florida lawmakers should establish a state-run network for realtors to report specific properties as potential targets of fraud. Ideally, the network would be able to tap a nationwide database to curb out-of-state purchases of stolen properties.
“Currently,” she said, “there is no system for marking a property as ‘not for sale.’” That should change too, she added.
In lieu of those and other proactive changes, Trestman said property owners should contact a realtor for guidance, reach out to their local MLS, create a Google alert for their property address and monitor sites like Zillow.
And of course, they should do the bare minimum and sign up for Clerk’s Office alerts here.
