[HN Gopher] Man left shocked as his house is 'stolen'
___________________________________________________________________
Man left shocked as his house is 'stolen'
Author : lbriner
Score : 260 points
Date : 2021-11-01 15:29 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.bbc.co.uk)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.bbc.co.uk)
| superfamicom wrote:
| I live in the US and had my debit card (number only, one of the
| bigger data leaks) stolen years ago and ever since then my bank
| will check every purchase with me over $300. It was really
| frustrating for years until someone else took my card (from
| another data leak) and was easily stopped and new card issued. I
| cannot imagine someone selling my home without involving me, or
| at the very least without several other of my personal contact
| methods also compromised at the same time.
| lbriner wrote:
| The Solicitor has no existing relationship with the real owner
| of the house. A bloke turns up and says they want to sell their
| house and has the correct Land Registry details and some ID,
| the solicitor does other checks and makes it all happen.
|
| The illegal seller must have known that the owner was away for
| some time though because even if everything is ready, it
| usually takes at least 2 months to go through.
| iso1631 wrote:
| Vast majority of house sales involve at least one of
|
| * an estate agent
|
| * a mortgage company (on the purchase or the sale)
|
| * involve a sale at a market rate
|
| * involve parties that know each other personally (family
| etc).
|
| To not have any of those surely should raise a warning flag
| that "this requires a little more investigation" than a
| forged driving license. This wasn't an abandoned house being
| sold after being empty for several years.
| wongarsu wrote:
| But surely the land registry has an existing relationship
| with the real owner of the land? Isn't that the entire point
| of the land registry, to be able to contact and deal with the
| person who owns a particular piece of land?
| martyvis wrote:
| I purchased my property in 1989. Any contact detail for me
| in the land registry in NSW Australia would be the house
| where I lived and the phone number there. Neither would be
| valid and lead them to me specifically. I certainly have
| never had further contact with them or they with me. So if
| someone presents themselves as me with a government issued
| driver's licence at the property address they would be none
| the wiser. (You'd normally also need to present say a
| utility bill and a credit card to have enough points to
| prove identity)
| inglor_cz wrote:
| The land registry could theoretically ask the tax office
| for current valid contact details, because the tax office
| is likely to be in closer contact with you...
| scosman wrote:
| Imagine if we really did tokenization of assets? This type of
| fraud would be much easier (steal password vs months long
| identity theft), and impossible to reverse.
| nootropicat wrote:
| Easier? It would become borderline impossible. How exactly do
| you steal the seed for a hardware wallet? How do you even know
| where it's stored?
| iso1631 wrote:
| You steal the wallet, you own the house. You lose the wallet,
| you no longer own the house.
| lifeisstillgood wrote:
| UK house owner - just signed up to the Land Registry alert
| system. Which has to be a record from not knowing something
| existed to signing up in four minutes.
|
| 1. The registry seriously refuses passwords that do not have
| alphanumeric characters only. Did not try Unicode.
|
| 2. Most of the UK is not in the land registry - it only is
| compulsory for land sold IIRR since the 1990s and generally has
| records going back to early 1900s. If someone owns land from
| before then, no-one publically knows who they are or who owns it.
| As most land in the UK is held by government or aristocracy and
| they have not needed to sell it for centuries we don't know who
| owns what.
|
| 3. This simply cannot be the first time - something this
| sophisticated, the original fraudster did not so this the first
| time now. How common is this? I mean see above - the land
| registry has a monitoring service for this ?
|
| 4. Thinking about it, I just added a monitoring account with just
| an email. If I create a new account and try to add $TargetAddress
| I find out if it is monitored - and I suspect that that is not
| going to count as a monitoring event !
| iso1631 wrote:
| About 85% of land in the UK is registered - including the vast
| majority of domestic dwellings.
| Aulig wrote:
| Something similar happened in Germany recently. A house worth
| millions was fraudulently sold like this. The original owners got
| it back luckily.
|
| German video about it: https://youtu.be/TolvzYzk64c
| kfprt wrote:
| These things always happen when a low trust society comes into
| contact with a high trust society.
| bellyfullofbac wrote:
| At least here the thieves were known (or even well-known). What
| if the buyer transferred money to some Nigerian prince who
| showed up with fake ID and disappeared after the sale? Would
| the buyer end up with no money and no house?
| ensignavenger wrote:
| My grandfather was rather fond of telling a story about a
| neighbor when he was younger who came home from vacation to find
| that their house had been stolen... like someone had brought a
| wagon and team of horses in, jacked up the house, and pulled it
| away. Being in a rather rural area, no one apparently noticed the
| heist!
| stretchwithme wrote:
| Talk about something that needs multifactor authentication.
| funshed wrote:
| UK does require you to prove your identity but the solicitor
| seems to have failed here with stolen identity. As the original
| owner did not update there details to another address.
| blunte wrote:
| "You and Yours obtained the driving licence used to impersonate
| Mr Hall" ... what? who?
|
| And then, "Once the house was sold to the new owner for PS131,000
| by the person impersonating Mr Hall, they legally owned it."
|
| The people who sold the house did not have the right to sell the
| house because they did not own it. The person who bought it does
| not own it since it was not legally sold.
| jonp888 wrote:
| You and Yours is a long running consumer affairs show on BBC
| Radio.
| blunte wrote:
| Hah! Thank you. I would have never guessed this.
| koonsolo wrote:
| It's weird that people get identified by their driver's license.
| Don't they have digital ID cards that are better suited for
| veryfying who is who?
| karatinversion wrote:
| The UK is funnily backwards about some things. In particular,
| they have neither national ID cards, nor a population registry.
| You end up sending utility bills to the government as proof of
| address.
| kybernetyk wrote:
| Police: "not my problem, lol".
|
| The joy of paying taxes.
| philpem wrote:
| It is pretty much how policing works in the UK. Declare it a
| civil matter, get it off the books as soon as possible... and
| that's not mentioning the mountain of police misconduct court
| cases that have popped up recently.
|
| Sadly the only chance of getting anything out of them is if the
| media get involved and hold their feet in the fire a bit.
| kfprt wrote:
| UK police looked the other way on child rape gangs for
| decades. Why would they care about this?
| so_throwaway wrote:
| Why do you expect the police to investigate this?
|
| If A says that B is trespassing on their property, and A not B
| is listed as the legal owner of the property according to the
| single source of truth, isn't it normal that the police should
| evict B and defend A's property rights?
|
| Imagine if the police took the attitude "we have to give equal
| weight to B's hard luck story about how he's the technical
| owner". Harassment and vexatious claims of fraud would be
| absolutely rampant.
| freeqaz wrote:
| Is it roughly the same to "prove" your identity in the US as it
| is in the UK? In the US, at least for most credit checks, you
| just need your SSN, some public record data about where you've
| lived, and personal data (name, DOB, etc).
|
| It's largely because there is no "National ID" system in the US
| (due to political reasons). That makes it hard for companies to
| track people, and the SSN is the only number that people
| consistently have.
|
| Are there any examples of countries where their government is
| getting this right and eliminating stupid fraud?
| AmericanBlarney wrote:
| Seems pretty questionable as to whether due diligence was done
| given the first indicator neighbors had of the sale was after
| the transaction occurred. At least in the U.S. it's typically
| pretty tough to miss that a house is up for sale - signage,
| open houses, realtors showing up to give tours. Curious how
| this buyer even connected with the seller.
| irrational wrote:
| I live in the USA, this year we both sold our previous home
| and purchased our new home without the use of signage, open
| houses, tours, realtors, etc. We found the house we bought
| and found the buyers of our old house through our network of
| friends. We filled out all the paperwork from forms we
| printed off online. The title company took care of everything
| after that. It was all done completely online until the very
| last signing. At that signing the title company person told
| us that they are almost ready to have everything completely
| done online so that nobody ever has to meet in person. So,
| shortly it will be possible to completely buy and sell a
| house without ever meeting in person. At the time I was just
| thinking about how easy and convenient it all was (and how
| much money we saved by not having realtors), but now I'm
| wondering about the fraud aspects.
| yupper32 wrote:
| > I live in the USA, this year we both sold our previous
| home and purchased our new home without the use of signage,
| open houses, tours, realtors, etc. We found the house we
| bought and found the buyers of our old house through our
| network of friends. We filled out all the paperwork from
| forms we printed off online.
|
| Surely you left a massive amount of money on the table
| then, right?
| irrational wrote:
| In what way? We sat down and decided how much we wanted
| for our house and told the potential buyers how much.
| They thought about it for a day and then told us they
| would give us that much money for the house. Maybe we
| could have made more on the open market, but we were
| happy and they were happy.
| yupper32 wrote:
| > Maybe we could have made more on the open market, but
| we were happy and they were happy.
|
| That's my point. You could potentially have made a lot
| more money on the open market. Especially if the buyers
| didn't even try to negotiate. That usually means they
| would pay more (let alone what other buyers might pay).
|
| The value of your house is what people are willing to pay
| for it, not what you think it's worth or what you want
| for it.
| AtlasBarfed wrote:
| Sounds like they avoided the 4-7% realtor commissions.
| tialaramex wrote:
| Yeah, here in the UK one of my friends bought his home
| off another of my friends. A third friend practices
| commercial property law, so she's insured to buy and sell
| property and did all their paperwork at mates rates. (Her
| employer buys her insurance, but it's personal insurance,
| so it covers her off-the-clock work too)
|
| Big saving all round.
| iso1210 wrote:
| I laughed at an old fashioned estate agent who wanted
| 1.2% to sell my house. Realtor prices in the US seem
| shockingly excessive. I guess it explains how Modern
| Family live such a nice lifestyle I guess.
| ska wrote:
| > Surely you left a massive amount of money on the table
| then, right?
|
| s/surely/potentially/
|
| They may have been better off also. At least the agent
| commissions are saved, and maybe other costs. If the
| buyer is motivated to buy, who knows if they weren't
| already over market?
| Johnny555 wrote:
| Off market sales are not unheard of in the USA -- my
| neighbor's condo was sold off-market. They were talking to a
| realtor to prepare to sell, and the realtor put them into
| touch with a buyer that paid cash for higher than they
| planned to list it at. So it's completely possible for a home
| to sell without neighbors being aware of it.
| kube-system wrote:
| Also, in my experience, many homes are listed on the
| realtors MLS systems before they hit public sites like
| Zillow.
|
| I bought my house right after it was listed on my realtors
| MLS system -- I had already made an offer before it ever
| hit Zillow or before there was a For Sale sign in the yard.
| michaelt wrote:
| In the UK there's no requirement that 'For Sale' signs be put
| up. Very few people look for a house to buy by driving around
| looking for such signs - online listings are what drive the
| traffic these days, and you can sell a house with nothing but
| online listings.
|
| Of course, most buyers will want to see the house themselves
| before making an offer, as estate agents are famously
| creative in their property descriptions. If you're getting a
| mortgage to buy a house, the bank will generally insist on a
| 'survey' where an independent third party turns up and
| confirms that the building physically exists and suchlike.
| lbriner wrote:
| Not sure whether they will ever find the link. Regarding
| signs etc. it sounds like the owner worked away so maybe the
| neighbours just assumed that he was selling?
|
| In the UK, it is very much a paperwork exercise, I have never
| met any of the solicitors I have sold houses with, haven't
| even spoken to most of them (everything on email)
| jaclaz wrote:
| I believe it depends, a house sale is no "ordinary" matter.
|
| In other european countries like, say, Italy, Spain, France
| there are national ID's and - opposed to solicitors like in the
| UK - notaries which are a sort of public officials for the
| contract (and they will check and certify the identities of the
| people involved, besides the acts of property) and you won't
| likely be able to open an account or however cash a check (I
| mean large sums, like the sale of a house) with someone else's
| identity in any bank without proper ID.
|
| Possibly, with at least two well forged pieces of ID[1], you
| can get around it in the bank, but I don't think it is easy.
|
| [1] this is (or used to be) a common request, though I doubt it
| is Law, when you want to open a bank account in Italy, and you
| need to exhibit the actual documents, not a photo or similar.
| jonp888 wrote:
| The UK also has national ID system. It is almost unique in
| Europe in this respect.
| iso1631 wrote:
| The UK _doesn 't_ have a national ID system. It's not clear
| how such a system would help in this situation - if the
| fraudster managed to get a driving license, why would they
| have a problem getting an ID card.
| jopsen wrote:
| Many national ID systems in the EU have a digital
| component. With two factor authentication.
|
| They are not perfect, but it raises the bar.
| iso1631 wrote:
| So if you lose your phone you can never get a replacement
| ID?
|
| Or is the 2FA not worth the paper it isn't printed on
| when it comes to replacements, and you're back to the
| same level of proof you need for a driving license or
| passport.
| anonymousisme wrote:
| "It's largely because there is no "National ID" system in the
| US (due to political reasons). That makes it hard for companies
| to track people, and the SSN is the only number that people
| consistently have."
|
| "Real ID" is now a thing. It's a "National ID".
| https://www.dhs.gov/real-id
| outworlder wrote:
| No it isn't. This might be the case when SSNs stop being
| requested for non social-security purposes and 'real id'
| starts to get used in its place.
|
| People don't necessarily have them either. Only those who
| have chosen to do so at a DMV.
|
| SSNs are often assigned at birth, for people born in the US.
| 2fast4you wrote:
| > REAL ID is a federal law, not an actual piece of ID.
| Congress passed the REAL ID Act in 2005. The act established
| minimum security standards for state-issued driver licenses
| and ID cards.
|
| https://www.dol.wa.gov/about/real-id-overview.html
|
| REAL ID doesn't sound like a federal ID system, it's just
| security standards for state issued ID cards.
| anonymousisme wrote:
| If states are complying to federal standards for ID, then
| it is effectively a federal ID.
| 2fast4you wrote:
| But they aren't issued or backed by the federal
| government. There isn't a national database for it, each
| state still has it's own system
| throaway46546 wrote:
| There is a national database. It is called SPEXS.
| mindslight wrote:
| There is no such thing as "getting this right" the way you're
| thinking. No matter what you choose, any possible source of
| truth will be imperfect. In this case, the UK Land Registry is
| used as a source of truth, but didn't thoroughly check IDs.
| Seemingly because the UK ID system is used as a source of
| truth, but then itself failed in some way.
|
| With an ambient concept of ownership, one is inherently left
| with a tradeoff between trusting the system as defined and
| being able to override it. In fact, this is exactly what caused
| this failure of the victim being unable to get their house back
| - compared to the common law deed system still prevalent in the
| US, whereby the buyer would be left without any title and would
| have to fall back on title insurance to be made whole.
|
| The only way to eliminate fraud is to _define away_ right and
| wrong, creating a single source of truth ala Bitcoin [0]. In
| Bitcoin if you have the privkey to a pubkey, then you can
| transfer value to a new pubkey, period - there is no such thing
| as theft, as it has been defined away. But obviously this isn
| 't the kind of harsh regime people have in mind when they say
| they want to eliminate fraud.
|
| FWIW the political problem in the US preventing national ID is
| the complete lack of ability to reign in corporate behavior.
| The ongoing abuse of SSN and drivers license numbers by private
| surveillance companies needs to be stopped (by something akin
| to the GDPR) before it would make any sense to talk about
| creating even stronger identification.
|
| [0] Actually this is going to fail for Bitcoin as well, because
| it lacks the key ecash property of untraceability. Since it
| lacks fungibility, it's only a matter of time until courts
| routinely override the computational system with their own
| version of truth.
| handrous wrote:
| The situation with government data in the US is extremely
| frustrating. Between the government themselves and quasi-
| governmental private companies (the credit bureaus) they know
| practically everything about us--but we refuse to let them use
| that information in any kind of helpful way to make our lives
| easier and reduce our stress & workloads, because that would be
| "big brother" or a step toward ushering in the end times (for
| foreigners: yes, seriously, that's not a joke) or whatever.
| lbriner wrote:
| It sounds like the fraudster got a copy of the real person's
| driving licence, although he must have looked the real person
| presumably.
|
| A Solicitor has to due the legal due-diligence to make sure
| they have the right to sell including usually ownership of the
| title deeds but if you don't have the title deeds and they are
| held by the Land Registry in name only, this is fairly easy to
| get around.
|
| I smell an insurance claim against the Solicitor but it depends
| whether they did everything correctly or not, otherwise I don't
| know where he stands.
| marcus_holmes wrote:
| though presumably in "these trying times" the entire
| transaction was done remotely and so the proof of ID was
| images/photos/scans rather than seeing the originals - a lot
| easier to forge and alter
| pmyteh wrote:
| I had to turn up in person to a solicitor's office with ID
| (and my face) for a recent house purchase (in England), so
| that's at least not universal.
| lbriner wrote:
| I have never done this for personal house sales in the
| UK, the only time we did it was when getting a commercial
| lease signed by the directors and each of them had to ID
| at the Solicitors offices.
|
| Thinking about it, it does seem very open to abuse!
| [deleted]
| cameronh90 wrote:
| Currently buying a house in the UK and it involved rather a lot
| of ID verification. I had to provide, to the bank, estate
| agent, mortgage broker and lawyers, the following: passport,
| driving license, utility bills, payslips, source of funds, bank
| statements, app-based liveness verification and more.
|
| However, in the event of an off-market cash transaction, a lot
| fewer parties are involved - potentially just a
| conveyancer/solicitor. I'm guessing it's them who hugely
| dropped the ball in identity verification.
| MeinBlutIstBlau wrote:
| Still need a purchase contract. But it's insane to me that UK
| law would allow for someone to forge documents in a civil
| matter and get away with it.
| mcguire wrote:
| " _app-based liveness verification_ "
|
| Ok, now you have me curious. Whazzat?
| spzb wrote:
| Same here. We completed over the summer and even had to
| provide our marriage certificate to the bank (no idea why,
| are single people not allowed mortgages?). Sounds very much
| like the conveyancers (lawyers) screwed up massively. There
| still some bits of this story I don't understand. Like, how
| did the fraudster get access to the house in the first place?
| Did he break in then fix the damage and replace the locks so
| he had a set of keys to give to the "buyer"?
| mcguire wrote:
| The breaking in is not really that hard. It could be a
| simple as calling a locksmith, telling them you were out of
| town on business and lost your keys, and asking them to re-
| key or replace the locks.
|
| If you've got the ID to sell the house, you certainly have
| enough ID to convince anyone else.
| martyvis wrote:
| >no idea why, are single people not allowed mortgages?
|
| The bank needs to know the status of the relationship
| because in the terrible event of it breaking up, your
| partner would have equity in the asset.
| Androider wrote:
| > Once the house was sold to the new owner for PS131,000 by the
| person impersonating Mr Hall, they legally owned it.
|
| That's nuts. Why isn't it the case that the person who failed to
| properly vet the seller is out of PS131,000 and the house? So I
| can "buy" a local mansion and then say "oops, I didn't know this
| random guy didn't own it. Oh well."
| anonporridge wrote:
| Also, how does the seller disappear with that much money
| without being able to be IDed? That seems like a severe failure
| of the state.
|
| It almost makes me wonder if this is a semi common scam wealthy
| folks use to take poor people's desirable homes.
| sdenton4 wrote:
| Paid in bitcoin?
| anonporridge wrote:
| Bitcoin is pretty easy to trace.
|
| Could more easily disappear if paid in cash.
| sdenton4 wrote:
| Seems to work well enough for ransomware...
| anonporridge wrote:
| Actually, no it doesn't.
|
| For example, the FBI was able to partially recover the
| Colonial Pipeline ransom, although that seems to be in
| part because the perpetrators were stupid by trying to
| sell it on a US exchange, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C
| olonial_Pipeline_ransomware_a...
|
| Criminals don't use bitcoin anymore.
|
| They use cash and monero.
| koonsolo wrote:
| Banks offer very little protection for scams like this.
| Basically "the money seems to be gone".
| anonporridge wrote:
| I mean, it's probably hard for bankers to turn in their
| distant cousins.
| mihaaly wrote:
| Since it was not sold by the owner it is difficult to argue for
| the legality of the transaction. Whoever claims bought
| something has nothing in fact, the person they've been in
| business with had nothing to sell. Selling nothing is nothing.
| The records are false!
|
| If the authorities assume things are in order here they should
| also be prosecuted for negligence or being accomplice and at
| least revert the FALSE transfer of ownership. (are we sure here
| that the 'buyer' is an unsuspecting party theyself?...)
| pc86 wrote:
| This sounds entirely like how you want things to work, or how
| you feel they "should" work in a just, fair world. It doesn't
| sound like you have any legal education or training to base
| this on.
|
| But I greatly prefer your version of events to what happened
| in the article so please prove me wrong!
| mihaaly wrote:
| Someone sold something that this person did not have. Sold
| nothing. Then what the buyer has? Nothing! There was an
| error in registering the transactions, it was a false
| transaction.
|
| How my will has anything to do about this or affecting if
| selling nothing becomes something or not?
|
| Where exactly a legal education needed for being able to
| recognise that the real owner did not sell or give away his
| property? If I am not a solicitor I cannot possibly
| comprehend what is a theft, fraud, or recognise bodily harm
| or crimes in general that are condemned by the society? I
| do not buy into that. The recognition of these kind of
| crimes are older than institutions dealing with those. If
| the stealing of the property is not prosecuted then the
| system is wrong, needs a fix.
| _0ffh wrote:
| Yeah, A gets scammed by B and C pays the price.
|
| If you can't get a hold on B, then clearly A should be the one
| all outta luck, not C.
|
| Absolutely insane!
| so_throwaway wrote:
| You are confusing who actually owned it, or who morally owned
| it, with who legally owned it.
|
| The claim is not that, once the legal issues and the fraud get
| untangled, the buyer will be held to be the rightful owner. The
| claim is that AT THE MOMENT, while the 'new owner' is listed in
| the Land Registry as owning it, and the 'old owner' isn't, the
| 'new owner' temporarily legally owns it.
|
| They have written this article as though to suggest that this
| is final and the original owner has no recourse. That isn't the
| case. What is the case is that the police don't have a remit to
| investigate the fraudulent sale. If person A is listed in the
| registry (they 'legally own' the property) and person B isn't,
| the police will follow person A's instructions to remove person
| B from the property, but not vice versa.
| the_mitsuhiko wrote:
| > temporarily
|
| I don't understand by what logic this sale is temporary? What
| mechanism can undo the sale?
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _AT THE MOMENT, while the 'new owner' is listed in the Land
| Registry as owning it, and the 'old owner' isn't, the 'new
| owner' temporarily legally owns it_
|
| Not an expert on British law, but I don't think this is the
| case. The new owner owns it.
|
| Not temporarily. Fully, permanently and properly. The
| previous owner was fraudulently deprived of it, and can
| likely get damages from the parties who signed off on the
| conveyance. But I don't think they have the right to reverse
| the transaction against the new owner's will.
| so_throwaway wrote:
| If you're not an expert on British law what makes you feel
| able to make such a confident and surprising claim?
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _If you 're not an expert on British law what makes you
| feel able to make such a confident and surprising claim?_
|
| The hubris of an internet commenter?
|
| Also, it's not surprising. It's unusual for a common law
| country. But in most jurisdictions, particularly those on
| statutory law, if the buyer is unrelated to the fraudster
| and is in possession, the register cannot be altered [1].
|
| This comes, in most places, out of the land registry
| being a reaction to protracted property disputes. (Often
| violent.)
|
| [1] https://www.bdbpitmans.com/insights/how-to-deal-with-
| propert...
| mdoms wrote:
| This is Hacker News. Confidently espousing on subjects we
| know little about is what we do.
| Sohcahtoa82 wrote:
| Pretty sure it's not specific to HN. _Any_ social media
| has this behavior.
| sofixa wrote:
| In France it's the notary's job ( who are the only ones who can
| validate a sale) to ensure that the seller is who they say they
| are, and that they do actually own the land/house/apartment.
| Wonder how that works across the Channel and whose
| responsibility it was.
| lbriner wrote:
| It is the same with a Solicitor but if they followed the
| correct process and the problem was actually with, say, the
| DVLA who issued a driving licence in the wrong name, I'm not
| sure who is liable for the error.
| koonsolo wrote:
| Why would you use a driver's license when everyone can have
| a digital ID card?
|
| In Belgium the notary will always ask for your digital ID
| card.
| the_svd_doctor wrote:
| Doesn't the UK _not_ have ID cards?
| lazide wrote:
| Plenty of folks haven't updated, or don't like dealing
| with it, or 'lost it' or whatever.
|
| Most people doing notary/certification on stuff like this
| are used to that kind of situation, so someone having an
| acceptable but not ideal ID method isn't going to slow
| this process down.
| ElFitz wrote:
| Don't we have actual, physical, titles, tied to the property?
|
| Could someone actually sell a house without those?
| gpderetta wrote:
| Unless the house/land is not yet registered, I believe that
| the land registry is supposed to be the ultimate authority
| and deeds are just piece of papers. Ai think you can always
| argue ownership in a curt of law of course.
| laurent92 wrote:
| The Notary in France doesn't necessarily fully do this job.
| They have an obligation of means, ie check the last 30 years
| of ownership and permits, but there are many cracks in that
| system:
|
| - Double ownership for 30 years followed by a proof of
| ownership from the real, hidden one;
|
| - Or simply it is the notary's understanding that there is no
| record past 12 years for example, and yet there is. If they
| have checked "the normal books", their duty is fulfilled.
| forty wrote:
| Is there stories of people getting their property stolen
| this way?
|
| My guess is that in France, if such a story as the article
| happended, the buyer would be kicked out of the house (and
| probably lose their money stolen by the fraudsters) but
| maybe I'm completely wrong.
| aclelland wrote:
| Yeah, that part confused me to. I'm pretty sure that if I
| bought a stolen xbox from some guy on a street corner and the
| Police find me with it, they'd not throw up their hands and say
| "oh well, I guess you own it now, on your way".
|
| I assume there is a specific legal quirk with property
| ownership.
| dtparr wrote:
| I believe the 'quirk' here is that the fraud was able to get
| property ownership updated with the Land Registry, so the new
| owner is the official owner of record.
| dgb23 wrote:
| So the Land Registry is at fault? Good luck...
| thereddaikon wrote:
| Sounds to me like in the UK you cant truly own land if the
| government can just decide it belongs to someone else.
| lazide wrote:
| Possession is 9/10ths of the law, and the gov't likes to
| claim possession of all real property in it's borders in
| some way or another
| ska wrote:
| > cant truly own land if the government can just
|
| This is mostly how private property works in practice,
| everywhere.
| aqsalose wrote:
| In civilized countries, it requires a specific decree or
| order by some government body, possibly after appeals.
|
| Not just random clerk writing a line in a book when
| random stranger comes and tells they own a piece of land
| and are going to sell it.
| _jal wrote:
| > Sounds to me like in the UK you cant truly own land
|
| Can you name a country that behaves differently?
| jopsen wrote:
| Yeah, you don't truly own land, you pay property taxes,
| etc.
|
| It's more like you lease the land :)
| codyb wrote:
| Pretty much true everywhere.
|
| It's not like you can take anything with you when you're
| dead, owning materials is really just a societal
| construct no matter which way you slice it.
| mensetmanusman wrote:
| Interesting point,
|
| I wonder if we will ever have a future where cryogenic
| freezing works and allows people to own land after they
| are temporarily dead.
| H8crilA wrote:
| Possession is a physical/real property of the universe.
|
| Ownership is a legal abstraction/construct.
| lazide wrote:
| Being allowed to possess something (instead of being drug
| off kicking and screaming by the cops) is also a
| societal/legal construct.
| enord wrote:
| >Possession is a physical/real property of the universe
|
| This assertion immediately falls apart on consideration
| IMO. Even in simple, controlled circumstances like
| football, the meaning of "possession" is subject to
| mutual agreement (i.e. "rules").
|
| You _could_ take some particular definition of
| "possession" as "natural" or otherwise axiomatic. This is
| not unheard of, but I think it's a trick of misdirection
| to place it in the domain of the "physical/real" when it
| is plainly a political matter.
| iammisc wrote:
| No. If you bought it, you own it. The thief now owes the
| original owner damages. This is true in the United States and
| I assume England since it's old common law stuff.
|
| It's why thieves try to steal and then turn over immediately.
| amerkhalid wrote:
| No, that's not correct in the US. If you buy stolen
| property unknowingly, it can be taken away from you.
|
| Had my TV stolen, it ended up in a pawn shop. Luckily, I
| had receipt and serial number. There was some paperwork and
| court order but pawnshop had to return TV to me.
| toss1 wrote:
| Yup, that is also why there are laws against Receiving
| Stolen Property [1] in the US. This is defined as:
|
| >>According to general receiving stolen property laws, it
| is a crime to accept or purchase any property which you
| believe or have actual knowledge that it was obtained
| through illegal means, such as theft. However, receiving
| stolen property is its own separate crime and thus should
| not be confused with the similar criminal acts of theft,
| robbery, or extortion.
|
| [1] https://www.legalmatch.com/law-
| library/article/receiving-sto...
| kybernetyk wrote:
| The quirk is that in the UK you're not a free man but only a
| subject and in the end the crown owns everything and now fuck
| off, filthy peasant, before the king sends his men.
| BoxOfRain wrote:
| This is true in practice pretty much everywhere governments
| exist though, it's not really a monarchy versus republic
| thing. The stick is no less painful if it's called
| "society's stick" rather than "the King's stick" if the
| government of the day decide to beat you with it.
| thesuitonym wrote:
| Is this really different than any other country? Any
| government (at least in uncontested territories) can come
| in and tell you to fuck off, and there's really very little
| you can do about it.
| erikerikson wrote:
| Quite the opposite. You ask the state to use their
| monopoly on legitimate use of force to enforce your
| rights in accordance to law. What you imply is a failed
| state. The state must maintain the legitimacy of that use
| to maintain consent of the people, that or it slides into
| far less prosperous configurations.
| lazide wrote:
| Being in a far less prosperous (in a meta sense)
| configuration is surprisingly not as big a deterrent as
| one might expect, especially if you are making them angry
| or the official involved would get far more prosperous
| (in a direct, concrete way) along the way.
| anonporridge wrote:
| Interesting side note. That's true for property, but not for
| cash.
|
| Cash is legally considered fungible. So, if someone steals a
| bunch of cash and buys something from you with it, even
| though that specific cash technically belonged to someone
| else before theft, it can't be reclaimed even if they can
| prove it.
| jakeinspace wrote:
| I'm aware of this, but I do wonder what happens if, rather
| than using the stolen cash to purchase goods, the thief
| gave away the money? Either to friends, a random homeless
| person on the street, or to registered charities. Would
| that be still considered unreclaimable?
| anonporridge wrote:
| idk. Maybe buy a random thing from them for an absurd
| amount?
|
| Or just make it rain on so many people that it's
| effectively impossible to get it all back. The power of
| decentralization.
| dmoy wrote:
| It depends on how Title law works in the jurisdiction.
|
| I don't know how it works in this part of the UK, but in many
| states in the US, the buyer would left holding the bag - the
| original homeowner would keep the property.
|
| It's one reason in the US that most property sales include a
| purchase of title insurance.
| lbriner wrote:
| I'm not a lawyer but the article implies that once the title
| is transferred, the new owner owns it! There might be
| liability with the Solicitor or the Land Registry, otherwise
| it would appear to be incredibly unfair!
| pmyteh wrote:
| That's right, I think. The property can be recovered from
| the fraudster, but not from an innocent subsequent
| purchaser. There _is_ at least some form of compensation
| scheme by the Land Registry. And 'selling on behalf of
| someone who isn't the actual owner' certainly can found a
| liability claim on the solicitor.
| Causality1 wrote:
| That's wild. Is there any other case where someone gets
| to keep stolen property as long as they didn't know it
| was stolen? I have to say if I was in the victim's
| position, my reaction would probably land me in prison
| for longer than the fraudster.
| White_Wolf wrote:
| I second that. If I'd end up losing my house to something
| like this... Let's just say nobody would get it by the
| end of it.
| pydry wrote:
| If you're implying what I think you're implying it would
| probably end with you in prison.
| reificator wrote:
| Losing the singular most expensive item you own, that
| typically contains the rest of your property, with no
| warning... that tends to end with you on the street which
| some may feel worse than prison.
|
| I'm not condoning that choice but recognize the
| consequences are particularly low when you're already at
| the bottom.
| lazide wrote:
| I think it's more 'if someone goes through an expensive
| and extensive legal process to purchase at great expense,
| some real property, starts taking it as their own in good
| faith, then later what may be the prior legal owner, but
| who was not who did all the legal paperwork comes back to
| me and claims fraud - do I have to move?'
|
| The issue is there are scenarios where the person writing
| the article may not actually be the legit owner - maybe
| they are delusional, or were squatting, or whatever.
| Maybe they are in league with the person who took off
| with the money, etc.
|
| And the person who bought it is out real money on the
| meantime and is trying to make a home in good faith -
| it's a pretty bad situation all around.
| tialaramex wrote:
| The Land Registry is the final arbitor of who owns what in
| England and Wales. So yes, right now the Registry says this
| New Owner owns this property, there is no way to contest
| this in a court of law, the official Land Registry
| paperwork is de jure supreme, it has the same legal effect
| as if an Officer from the Registry was in Court to say yup,
| that's who owns this property says the Crown.
|
| But, of course what we've got here is apparently Fraud.
| Presumably the likely legal outcome is that the actual sale
| price or, if higher, fair market value, must go to the
| previous legitimate owner. Unless the new owner is shown to
| have committed fraud.
|
| The Solicitors are required to be insured. And of course
| the Government owns the Land Registry and so is quite
| capable of standing any of its potential liabilities,
| though it seems most likely the Solicitors screwed up here
| in accepting bogus "proof" of identity.
| ineedasername wrote:
| Strange that the Land Registry decides on an issue that
| is basically a matter of contract law: The buyer entered
| into a fraudulent contract.
|
| Nonetheless, here's how the Land Registry handles matters
| of fraud:
| https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/rectification-
| and...
| justinclift wrote:
| Wow: 3.2 Suspected fraud or forgery
| If someone suspects that a fraud has taken place or is
| about to take place in relation to their property, they
| should contact us immediately. In many cases, we will
| be able, on application, to enter a standard form
| restriction LL in the register, that requires a
| certificate to be given by a conveyancer that they are
| satisfied that the person who executed a document
| lodged for registration as disponor is the same person
| as the proprietor. It will also be advisable
| to take legal or other professional advice to try
| to minimise any loss.
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| > _The Land Registry is the final arbitor of who owns
| what in England and Wales._
|
| I don't think that's true because for instance there are
| still properties unregistered (as mandatory registration
| was phased in until 1990). Certainly it seems possible to
| rectify the Register, not least in case of fraud [1]
|
| Also, in English law, a valid sale of land must meet
| strict criteria, including being made by Deed. I am not a
| lawyer but I don't see how the Deed can valid in this
| case since it did not involve the legal owner at all!
|
| Since solicitors must check identities (how could they
| have failed that?) and executing a Deed includes signing
| it in the presence of a witness I suspect a number of
| people have at the minimum massively screwed up, and the
| witness is likely an accomplice.
|
| [1]
| https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/rectification-
| and...
| ineedasername wrote:
| It seems to be true:
| https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/rectification-
| and...
| tialaramex wrote:
| > there are still properties unregistered
|
| But, if the Registry says your property is registered,
| and that Jim owns it, the fact you say it isn't
| registered doesn't trump that. You would need to persuade
| a Court that the Registry is wrong, and then they'd need
| to tell the Registry to fix that. Until both those things
| happen, Jim owns it.
|
| > I am not a lawyer but I don't see how the Deed can
| valid in this case since it did not involve the legal
| owner at all!
|
| Prima Facie there's a Deed which says the legal owner
| sold it. Now we've got this chap, says he's the legal
| owner, says he never signed that paperwork. That's a
| contradiction, which is true? So that's the sort of
| problem we have Courts for.
|
| My guess is, this chap is exactly who he says he is,
| there's a fraudster somewhere with PS131000 of somebody
| else's money who won't show up to court.
|
| But of course it's also possible this is a different
| fraud in progress. The chap who claims it was "stolen"
| has PS131000 in an account in his friend's name, and now
| wants both the house and the money.
|
| A judge gets to decide the truth of the matter. Often
| things are clear cut (e.g. the "driving license" proves
| to be a badly photocopied Photoshop image, a solicitor's
| clerk admits a "face to face" transaction actually took
| place on Zoom, the bank account is traced to a known
| crook who fled the country last week) but sometimes it's
| just very hard to decide, which is why we need smart,
| honest people to do that job and decide what's a fair
| outcome when it's unclear.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Doesn't the registry have some level of 'duty of care'?
| lazide wrote:
| Seems like the ID was pretty convincing, and the real
| owner (assuming the paper did their due diligence!)
| wasn't there at the property - so everyone involved may
| have done a decent amount of checking, but it wasn't
| enough because the fraudster knew how to play the system
| to get through the normal hurdles. It does happen.
|
| Sounds like a court needs to dig in and figure out what
| is going on for sure.
| sjg007 wrote:
| It sounds like a sophisticated fraud. They probably
| target clergy or others who have well known public
| schedules. I assume there is an equivalent of title
| insurance in the UK that will pay out though.
| jacquesm wrote:
| The original owner is not going to be the one with title
| insurance though, that's usually bought by the buyer, not
| the seller, especially not a seller who isn't even aware
| that there is a transaction.
| zarzavat wrote:
| Yes I expect that, if pressed, the courts would void the
| entire transaction and restore the property. The land
| registry may be the arbiter of who currently owns what,
| but the courts are the arbiter of what "happened"
| according to the law.
|
| Otherwise it sets an absurd precedent. If it was not some
| man's house but a critical piece of infrastructure, the
| courts are not going to stand idly by and let some random
| person take possession of Sellafield, or for that matter,
| Harrods.
|
| But the existing owner will probably settle for
| compensation instead of fight a lengthy court battle.
| pmyteh wrote:
| No, the courts wouldn't. A genuine innocent purchaser,
| properly registered at the Land Registry, has good title.
| (Note: not the fraudster - their downstream victim). The
| original victim's options for recompense are the scammer,
| the solicitors who did the conveyance for the fraudster
| (if negligent), or the Land Registry itself.
|
| Nobody is going to end up as the accidental innocent
| purchaser of a stolen Sellafield, so that's not a
| concern. If the government really needs to reverse a
| transaction under these circumstances it could use a
| compulsory purchase order or a private act of Parliament.
| lazide wrote:
| Who pays back the 150k uk pounds?
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| The article says "The Land Registry paid out a total of
| PS3.5m in compensation for fraud last year." which tends to
| imply they have some liability.
| pdmccormick wrote:
| I wonder if that means they don't pay all that much
| compensation on a case by case basis, or if there isn't
| that much fraud occurring to begin with.
| pmyteh wrote:
| I suspect they'd rather you claimed against the fraudster
| or a solicitor, with the compensation fund as a backstop.
| If that is the case, it could be neither: just that most
| people get recompensed elsewhere.
| MeinBlutIstBlau wrote:
| This and un-filed liens are typically why you should always
| pay for owners policies on title. Otherwise if something
| comes up, you're royally fucked.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _I don 't know how it works in this part of the UK, but in
| many states in the US, the buyer would left holding the bag -
| the original homeowner would keep the property_
|
| Different ways of dealing with the problem of fraudulent
| transfer and property records. In the U.S., the risk is the
| buyer's. If the property was fraudulently transferred, the
| transaction is mutable. This makes the sureness of ownership,
| as well as the record, less reliable, while making ownership
| _per se_ more.
|
| The U.K. flips that assessment. If the Land Registry says you
| own the property, you can rest assured you own it. No re-
| litigating whether that transfer two sales back was done
| correctly. In exchange, this shit.
|
| If you consider each country's history with respect to
| property and power, it makes sense.
| torstenvl wrote:
| It isn't about property and power, though. It's about
| _knowledge_ and power. The buyer _knows_ there 's a
| transaction being contemplated. The buyer _knows_ how to
| contact the seller and /or their agents. The owner does
| not. The predominant U.S. system requires buyers to guard
| against known unknowns. The U.K. system requires owners to
| guard against _unknown_ unknowns. It 's a least-cost-
| avoider problem, and it has a clear answer.
| jonny_eh wrote:
| Also the buyer is either a scammer or a dupe. The owner
| is just a victim. Either way, the buyer should clearly be
| held responsible and cover all costs to resolve.
| jopsen wrote:
| Or as alluded to in the article, it's a civil matter,
| maybe you can sue solicitors involved, or the Land
| Registry.
| AlexCoventry wrote:
| > _If you consider each country 's history with respect to
| property and power, it makes sense._
|
| Could you elaborate on that, please? I don't know which
| historical aspects you're referring to.
| chongli wrote:
| _If the Land Registry says you own the property, you can
| rest assured you own it._
|
| Sounds to me like you can only rest assured at the moment
| the Land Registry tells you. After that, it's only a matter
| of time before some scammer sells your house out from under
| you. Not a great system.
| Seattle3503 wrote:
| Seems like you should be able to lock your title just
| like domain names.
| martinflack wrote:
| > In the U.S., the risk is the buyer's. If the property was
| fraudulently transferred, the transaction is mutable.
|
| Ironically you're describing the original English legal
| system centered around deeds.
|
| But a few US States, some of the UK Commonwealth, and
| England, as it sounds from this article, use the Torrens
| system[1].
|
| The difference is whether the deeds are primary and the
| registry a mere copy (or even optional); or the registry
| primary and any papers reflecting registration a mere copy.
|
| But generally with a Torrens system there is some statutory
| compensation for fraud cases.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torrens_title
|
| (IANAL so this may be incorrect)
| anonAndOn wrote:
| In the US, the buyer is often required to purchase title
| insurance which would likely cover fraudulent transfer.[0]
|
| [0]https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/title_insurance.asp
| iammisc wrote:
| The us doesn't have centralized land registries.
|
| While the counties record titles as a matter of convenience,
| the true title is determined by the courts.
|
| Other countries have centralized registries so that if the
| country's database says X piece of land is owned by Y, that's
| final. In the us it can be litigated and title insurance
| comes into play for the buyer who purchased it fraudulently.
| bsanr wrote:
| A reminder, once again, that "identity theft" does not exist. It
| is fraud, plain and simple, and the responsibility of the
| businesses which aren't performing due diligence in confirming
| your identity. 6-figure sums shouldn't be exchanging hands
| without multiple layers of confirmation. This could easily have
| been avoided with a search for any other numbers associated with
| the man and a call to them to confirm.
| desktopninja wrote:
| When signing/transferring over the title deed, aren't all parties
| involved supposed to be physically present in front of a
| lawyer/notary?
|
| Me thinks due diligence by all members involved in this
| transaction was severely lacking and they should be held
| accountable. I.e. Real Estate agent, bank, brokers, what have
| you. One could even say they all conspired in this property
| theft.
|
| Alternatively, perhaps the victim was lacking some sort of
| documentation that allowed the illicit procurement to occur?
| ineedasername wrote:
| It seems this is becoming somewhat common in the UK:
| https://www.step.org/industry-news/uk-solicitors-warned-grow...
| theonlybutlet wrote:
| "it's a civil matter" seems to be the go to excuse for British
| police. There's a whole TV series following property owners in
| the UK who have experienced issues and this response comes up way
| too often in the series.
| Animats wrote:
| This is apparently enough of a problem in the UK that the land
| registry has procedures for locking a title and for reporting
| frauds.[1]
|
| [1] https://www.gov.uk/protect-land-property-from-fraud
| iptrans wrote:
| Sounds like the Land Registry is missing a NoTransfers bit in
| their settings for properties.
| ElFitz wrote:
| It's wild to think that DNS registries might be better
| protected than real estate ownership.
| zeristor wrote:
| Seemingly the gem Earth of the issue is the proof of identity.
|
| Mention is made of a driving licence being obtained to open a
| bank account, was this the actual Driving licence? If it had been
| faked then the bank should have raised a flag.
|
| There is a fair amount about having a government account to log
| in for taxes etc, is this robust enough to be used in property
| transaction like this? I not why?
|
| Will this example highlight a number of other similar cases? Will
| it prompt others to try it?
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| I remember reading about a "sovereign citizen" outfit, doing
| something similar, in the US.
|
| In that case, the "sovereign citizen" would get bounced out on
| their ear, but they can still make the homeowner's life a
| nightmare.
|
| https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/sovereign-citizens-sentence...
|
| https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/26/nyregion/moors-newark.htm...
| [deleted]
| pjdemers wrote:
| In the US, there is title insurance. If the seller didn't have
| the legal right to sell the house, the house reverts to the legal
| owner, and the buyer is paid back by the insurance. It's not
| possible to get a mortgage without title insurance, and a cash
| buyer would be nuts to not demand it from the seller. In some
| states (example, California) it can get more complicated, though,
| because the right to sell a house isn't the same thing as the
| right to live in it. They buyer may own the house, but not have
| the right to force the current occupants to leave. That's why
| it's important to state in the contract that the house must be
| completely empty before the seller gets paid, and every month
| that it is not completely empty, a few thousand dollars is
| subtracted from the purchase price.
| merpnderp wrote:
| In some states you can buy a house without title insurance. I
| assume this is so that people who enjoy Russian roulette and
| jumping out of planes without parachutes can enjoy the same
| adrenaline rush when buying a home.
| bluGill wrote:
| Some states protect their titles better than others. In Iowa
| (possibly other states) land transfers are done by the state
| who verifies the seller really has right to sell the
| property, so title insurance isn't something you need to buy.
| (title insurance does cover other things as well, so banks
| make your buy it for those things, but once the sale is
| closed it is your property)
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| Perhaps, but in some places (aka Texas) title insurance is
| unnecessarily and outrageously expensive:
|
| https://www.texasobserver.org/entitled-to-profit-in-texas-
| ti...
| tantalor wrote:
| It's common to buy real estate from someone you already
| trust, such as a family member. You know the title was good
| when they bought it, so you can bet the title insurance fee
| (several thousand dollars) against that trust nothing fishy
| happened since then.
| drfuchs wrote:
| But what if something fishy happened before they sold it to
| you, but it isn't discovered until after? Does their title
| insurance still cover it? For instance, if their original
| purchase turns out to not have been legitimate to begin
| with for some reason.
| conductr wrote:
| Yes, title insurance is a single premium but gives the
| owner forever coverage. This is essentially the purpose,
| to give the buyer confidence that they are protected for
| anything that may have happened that they wouldn't know
| about, because the seller may not even know about it and
| potentially it happened 100s of years ago.
|
| Where this gets kind of crazy is if you own a property
| and have title insurance on it from when you bought it,
| then you do a refinance, you're often required to buy the
| insurance again because that original policy ends.
|
| All said, the loss ratio of title insurance companies is
| extremely low compared to other types of insurances. But
| in some places it's cost is fairly high (eg Texas) and
| it's mostly to do with strong political interests /
| lobbying
| drfuchs wrote:
| But what if I'm not the owner anymore? Specifically, I
| buy a house and purchase title insurance on it. Later, I
| sell the house to you. You trust me completely, so figure
| you don't need to buy title insurance. Later, unexpected
| to all of us, it turns out that my original purchase was
| somehow flawed, and someone else actually owns the house.
| You now ask me to now invoke my title insurance, and
| (since I'm such a nice guy) reimburse you. So I call up
| my title insurance company, and explain that while I no
| longer even think I own the house, something was amiss in
| my original purchase, and I want them to reimburse me.
| The title insurance company agrees that there was a
| problem at the time of my purchase. Will they then say
| "Yes, you're right, the check is in the mail" or "No, be
| that as it may, once you 'sold' the house we're off the
| hook; tell the guy who 'bought' it from you to contact
| _their_ title insurance company "?
| kube-system wrote:
| IIRC, casually passing down property to heirs is a common
| scenarios in which titles _do_ become disputed.
|
| Let's say your mom lives in a house, and she sells it to
| you without a title. No big deal, because it was family
| property she got from her parents and she's lived there her
| entire life. Right?
|
| Maybe not, when your grandparents children and
| grandchildren show up and claim their fraction of ownership
| of the grandparents' estate.
|
| i.e. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heir_property
| [deleted]
| closeparen wrote:
| This seems backwards. To evict someone you have to swear up and
| down that you're going to occupy the place yourself. People get
| prosecuted for e.g. doing an owner-move-in eviction and then
| selling to a developer. The old owner doesn't have a legal
| basis to get rid of the tenant, but the new owner does.
| xyzzyz wrote:
| From the perspective of the buyer, I don't care how exactly
| the owner removes the tenant. It is immaterial to me. What I
| care about is that no tenant occupies the property I am
| purchasing. If the owner cannot guarantee that, eg. they
| cannot legally evict a tenant, that's fine, I simply wont buy
| the property, it is the owner's problem, not mine.
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| > I don't care how exactly the owner removes the tenant. It
| is immaterial to me. What I care about is that no tenant
| occupies the property I am purchasing.
|
| Landlords can't legally evict a leased tenant who hasn't
| violated their lease.
|
| That there are tenants in the home would be part of the MLS
| listing, along with bed/bath. If you've gotten as far as
| inquiring about the property, you would know you're buying
| tenants (at least until their lease is up or they accept
| your offer to break it).
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| > To evict someone you have to swear up and down that you're
| going to occupy the place yourself.
|
| Where do you get this from? It's not like any US law I've
| ever heard of.
|
| For the evictions I've worked on, the homeowner simply wanted
| the tenants out (non-payment, etc) so they could re-rent or
| sell the property. They didn't ever have to live there.
| closeparen wrote:
| https://sftu.org/justcauses/
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| That doesn't seem to say the landlord can only evict if
| they themselves are going to personally reside there.
|
| The listed causes for eviction all seem fairly typical -
| like non-payment.
| bubblethink wrote:
| That's very city/state dependent. SF has a lot of tenant
| protections, which is probably what the parent was
| referring to. In a lot of old SF apartments, the landlord
| can only evict a tenant under specific conditions, one of
| which is owner moving in
| (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ellis_Act).
| horsawlarway wrote:
| Eh - depends on why you're buying the house.
|
| There are a lot of rental properties for sale with "tenants in
| place" in my area.
|
| If you want to live in it, then yes - Ensure seller is
| responsible for removal.
|
| If you want to continue renting the property then a lot of
| times it's easier for both parties to complete the sale and
| then let the current rental contract conclude before doing
| reno/construction.
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| If there's a lease in place, that lease continues unabated.
|
| If the new owner wants the tenants out, the tenants have to
| agree to break the lease. Otherwise the tenants can continue
| to live there until their lease runs out.
|
| It doesn't matter whether these are the best options for the
| owner(s). They're the only options.
| janandonly wrote:
| I am baffled by the fact that a complete house can be had for the
| little sum of PS131,000.
|
| That's about EUR150.000 in real money... I guess where I live
| that would get me a garage, maybe.
| MeinBlutIstBlau wrote:
| Ahem...you're missing a $ :)
| iso1631 wrote:
| Luton isn't exactly the nicest of places, but PS131k is way
| below the asking price for even the cheapest houses there
| nickkell wrote:
| It's an absolute steal
| fortran77 wrote:
| It's odd that in the UK a person who buys stolen property legally
| owns it.
| so_throwaway wrote:
| They legally own it in the sense that they are the legally
| registered owners, currently.
|
| They do not legally own it in the sense that the original owner
| will not be able to eventually recover it after the fraud is
| unravelled.
|
| Your instinct that this is odd is correct. It is odd because it
| isn't actually true. The statement of a police officer made
| while standing on the street outside someone's house deciding
| whose story to believe is not the final legal verdict on this
| case.
| funshed wrote:
| Every story I have read about this before is the transaction(s)
| are reversed. I presume the owner opted for cash instead of the
| property back.
| ballenf wrote:
| While people decry the inability for crypto transactions to be
| adjudicated in court, what we don't talk about as much is that
| this is also the direction of non-crypto transactions. As the
| article stated, the police initially refused to even consider the
| theft of the man's house a crime.
|
| We used to say possession is 9/10ths of the law. Now it seems the
| algorithm is 9/10ths of the law.
|
| You have maybe 10% chance to reverse a transaction that was
| approved by the computers. Or at least we're headed that way.
| lbriner wrote:
| That's not what they said. They said it was not criminal but
| civil, which a lot of contract and tort law falls under, it
| means the police won't do the investigation for you.
|
| I don't know why they considered that this was not fraud, which
| is criminal but maybe they couldn't point to a detail that
| showed where the fraud took place.
|
| They might also have been wrong to say that!
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > the police won't do the investigation for you
|
| Even in criminal matters, they don't do the investigation
| _for you_ , they do it for public prosecutors, which may or
| may not have incidental utility to you.
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| The article says "Police initially told him it was not fraud
| but are now investigating." My guess is the police couldn't
| be bothered.
|
| A friend of mine had a problem with squatters moving into his
| house (which wasn't empty). Initially the police refused to
| get involved until he got his solicitor to point out it was a
| criminal issue.
| pintxo wrote:
| Really interesting, a very similar case has recently been
| reported in Berlin, Germany [1]. Here the fraudsters tried to get
| legal ownership of a whole apartment building in Berlin. It seems
| they nearly made it, but then some insurance company sent a
| letter to the actual owners who could successfully blocked the
| transaction from committing.
|
| [1] (in German) https://www.spiegel.de/panorama/justiz/berlin-
| wie-ein-rentne...
| MeinBlutIstBlau wrote:
| This exact reason is why in the US you physically need to be in
| person to sign loan documents to purchase property. You need 2
| forms of ID, verified by the parties, copies of it taken, and
| notarized.
| iso1631 wrote:
| It was likely a cash purchase, certainly was a cash sale, and
| the ID was verified by the solicitors.
| jokoon wrote:
| It became much funnier when I remember the old saying "property
| is theft". Quite fitting to this news.
| tialaramex wrote:
| For what it's worth. If you own Real Property in England, even if
| only a Leasehold (Long Lease e.g. 99 years) you can get the Land
| Registry to email you about activity or, once per year, the lack
| of activity for your property records.
|
| https://propertyalert.landregistry.gov.uk/
|
| Land Registry records have a sort of poor man's locking. The
| buyers (or in practice their solicitor) need to first perform a
| "Search" which would get recorded as activity, some time before
| they can file paperwork to claim it was sold, and so that gives
| you considerable time to say "Hey, I'm not selling this, why is
| there a Search by Honest But Incompetent Solicitors LLC?" and
| phone up to yell at somebody.
| mihaaly wrote:
| It is always nice being vigilant for all and every possible
| scam and fraud out there coming our ways, being ready and
| prepared for whatever comes from whatever direction and for
| whatever target of ours, going after every suspicious matters
| we encounter or believe we encounter, being suspitious against
| as much as possible preparing ourselves for all kinds that
| could happen out there, but shouldn't be required. If it is
| required then the sytem does not work, need to be fixed! Not
| the victims.
| bunnie wrote:
| I have to agree with this. A little O/T, but reminds me a bit
| of how US patents are handled. If you're able to constantly
| monitor patent publications (the stage where patents are
| disclosed but still in review), it is cheap and easy to
| challenge applications. But good luck trying to get any work
| done while trying to to keep up with the deluge of patent
| publications!
|
| If you miss your chance to challenge the patent before it
| issues, the cost to protest goes way up, even if your
| arguments would have been just as valid during the
| publication phase.
|
| I get that the system is trying to reward vigilance, but it
| punishes people who put more time into sharing ideas than
| protecting them, especially considering the PTO does not
| search most modern repositories of open source for prior art.
| macksd wrote:
| This is how I feel. I'm all for encouraging potential victims
| to take reasonable precautions, but especially when the
| system could be fixed if a few people tried, it eventually
| gets tiresome. I've been given free "credit monitoring" a few
| times because of data breaches at places that should have
| done a better job of protecting my data. But there is so much
| noise impacting my credit score that I just don't even bother
| looking at it anymore. I would hope this property system does
| better, at least. The annual "no activity" email would at
| least be nice occasional dose of peace-of-mind.
| blibble wrote:
| if you're really paranoid you could put a charge on it too
| (like a bank or a building society would have)
|
| makes it a much less tempting target
| sdenton4 wrote:
| This sort of scam is really common in Kenya. Walking around
| you'll see plenty of houses with large spray-painted letters
| stating 'THIS HOUSE IS NOT FOR SALE.'
| milliams wrote:
| Ah, I wondered why those signs were so prevalent when I
| visited. Thanks for the explanation.
| brightball wrote:
| In the US I've always been told it's in the best interest of a
| home owner to always have some type of bank loan on the
| property. Mortgage, even a zero balance HELOC. Supposedly, this
| allows the bank to ensure there's no title fraud because they
| maintain a claim to it.
| rectang wrote:
| That's messed up -- it pushes the blame onto the victims for
| not monitoring.
| _jal wrote:
| Rather similar to "identity theft", the strange name for a
| particular form of (usually bank) fraud.
| kelnos wrote:
| Please don't throw around accusations of victim-blaming like
| this.
|
| No one is claiming that the victim is at fault. But I do
| think it's useful information to pass along that it's
| possible to get notified of things like this before they
| become big problems.
|
| It's like... it's not my fault if I get mugged at 3am in a
| part of the city known for being full of violent crime, but I
| also should have known better than to be walking around in a
| part of the city known for violent crime at 3 in the morning.
| Just because I am the victim, it doesn't mean I couldn't have
| avoided an incident if I'd used common sense.
|
| It's about outcomes and reality: sometimes we have to take on
| a little extra responsibility in order to make it less likely
| a bad thing will happen. That's not fair or just, but it's
| the way the world works.
| rectang wrote:
| The problem is the absurdly unjust system that needs
| monitoring. It's not "just the way the world works",
| because it doesn't have to be the way that it is, and it
| should not be the way that it is.
|
| A system that requires constant, complicated intervention
| to function properly ensures that those with the resources
| and background to know that they have to exercise constant
| vigilance against malfeasance will come out ahead over the
| long run.
| wins32767 wrote:
| In general that's true, but in this particular case I'm
| not sure it follows. This is a very infrequent
| occurrence, which is why it made the news. From a
| societal perspective, further investment in security here
| is probably a net drag since all those security measures
| will also apply to every valid sale and there are vastly
| more of those. The pot of money that pays out to victims
| of fraud doesn't make those people whole, but it's enough
| to solve the problem well enough that it's probably
| reasonably close to a global minimum in terms of total
| cost across everyone in society. For those that are
| concerned about the personal risk, being able to do your
| own monitoring is a nice enhancement.
| lazide wrote:
| It is a infrequent yet catastrophic risk however for
| everyone that owns any land or property in the UK - and
| it would definitely keep me up at night if I had any
| property there!
| blitzar wrote:
| > it would definitely keep me up at night if I had any
| property there
|
| If that would keep you up at night, then given all the
| actual dangers in the world you have never slept.
| OJFord wrote:
| What is unjust? There's (claimed) fraud committed, and
| it's under investigation. 'Justice has not yet been
| served', sure, but maybe let 'the system' work before
| decrying it as 'unjust'?
|
| What would you have be done differently, immediately turf
| out the new 'owner', who in his eyes paid for it fair and
| square?
|
| Assuming it's all true, presumably it _will_ be returned
| to the true owner, the transaction reversed, and the
| cheated non-owner will have a solid civil case against
| the defrauder for the inconvenience and expense.
| [deleted]
| sdenton4 wrote:
| Truth. A much better system would be for the titles office to
| proactively get in touch with owners through a second channel
| to inform them of any activity/changes, including change of
| communication details.
| dahfizz wrote:
| This is a pathetic and harmful attitude. You should not
| encourage victims (or would be victims) to be helpless.
| eropple wrote:
| I immediately parsed 'rectang's post as not implicating the
| failure-prone system that allows this and _necessitates_
| having the victims of such fraud be vigilant in such a
| manner.
|
| And they are correct.
| [deleted]
| gumby wrote:
| Seems like the point of the conveyancer is to prevent this sort
| of thing.
|
| In California it seems that a title transfer company is in
| practice the only way to transfer property, and for their
| exorbitant fee they do at least insure the buyer against this
| risk in perpetuity.
|
| (Last time I bought a house in California I read the seller's
| insurance policy and discovered its perpetual nature. I realized
| that if I ever had a problem I could sue the seller and their
| policy would cover me (and them). Unfortunately the title company
| refused to do the transfer until I bought my own title insurance.
| What a ripoff)
| implements wrote:
| Any UK reader can avoid this by signing up to:
|
| https://propertyalert.landregistry.gov.uk/
|
| It's the Land Registry itself, it's free, and: "Once you have
| signed up to the service, you will receive email alerts when
| certain activity occurs on your monitored properties, allowing
| you to take action if necessary."
| op00to wrote:
| This is the same bs we have to deal with in the US with
| financial credit and social security numbers. Because there's
| no actual security, the individual must monitor their own
| credit for abuses, or prevent anyone from accessing it via a
| freeze.
| cstross wrote:
| Only covers England and Wales -- not Scotland and Northern
| Ireland. So not actually UK wide.
| m4tthumphrey wrote:
| Just signed up to this. Only alpha numeric passwords allowed.
| Always worries me.
| _0ffh wrote:
| I guess you'll just have to hope that they don't truncate the
| password after the first eight characters or so...
| pc86 wrote:
| Hey as long as they truncate it the same way on login as
| they do on account creation... /s
| vmception wrote:
| Another reason to use an anonymous LLC/entity. The owning entity
| gets a new state identification number which won't have appeared
| in as many leaks to be impersonated. While the individual owner
| of the LLC isn't known to impersonate.
| gruez wrote:
| 1. doesn't that shift the problem to impersonating the LLC? If
| anything that seems easier than impersonating a person?
|
| 2. does this work with financing? how do mortgages work?
| filoleg wrote:
| > _doesn 't that shift the problem to impersonating the LLC?_
|
| Correct, but as the grandparent comment says, the likelihood
| of identifying info of your LLC (that could be fraudulently
| used) to appear in as many data leaks is way less than that
| of your personal info.
|
| Plus, even if this type of fraud is still technically
| possible with LLC (albeit with much more difficult steps),
| just the fact that it is more difficult should discourage the
| criminals (unless they have some personal vendetta against
| you). Similar to all the nigerian prince emails, why would
| they go for a target that is more protected, as opposed to
| going for any much less secured targets? Hence why they
| intentionally make their scam emails as obvious as possible,
| so that they know if the person took the bait, then they are
| super likely to follow through with the scam until the very
| end. No reason for fraudsters to make their own lives more
| difficult.
| vmception wrote:
| Social engineering is always a threat to anyone. What
| occurred in this article would not have been available if the
| entity was the owner.
| lbriner wrote:
| Not a reason for the UK. We don't have anonymous companies like
| the US e.g. by assigning your attorney as a director so they
| can hide behind privilege.
|
| The Directors of your limited company would be available for
| all to see with their address!
| vmception wrote:
| The company that buys the house doesn't need to be formed in
| the UK.
| gifnamething wrote:
| Now you're paying extra SDLT
| jchook wrote:
| Reminded of Victor Lustig, who sold someone the Eiffel Tower.
|
| He impersonated a government official and told a group of scrap
| metal dealers it was too costly to maintain and that it was set
| to be demolished and sold as scrap.
|
| The man who purchased it was too embarrassed to go to
| authorities, lest it ruin his reputation.
| anonu wrote:
| This is somewhat the point of "title insurance" in the US. In
| this case the buyer would be protected since technically the real
| owner never actually sold the property.
| vanilla-almond wrote:
| A bit long, but here is a summary from the BBC Radio programme
| _You and Yours_ which has more detail than the BBC News report:
|
| _Background_
|
| Mike Hall (owner of the property) moves around a lot due to his
| work. He rents out his home, but due to COVID the property has
| been empty for some time.
|
| _Returning to his property_
|
| When Mr Hall returned to his house he could tell clearly the
| house has been broken into. The front door window pane had been
| smashed and partially replaced, and the locks had been replaced.
|
| _Reporting to the police_
|
| Police told Mr Hall it was a civil matter and Mr Hall had to
| leave the house and contact his solicitors.
|
| Mr Hall put in an online application to Bedfordshire Police
| Service to notify them of a crime. Every time he got an automated
| replying stating this was not a criminal offence but a civil
| matter.
|
| He also contacted Action Fraud (UK's national reporting centre
| for fraud and cybercrime, run by the City of London Police). They
| also said it was a civil offence and they could not help him.
|
| Mr Hall: "So everywhere I turned, it was a closed door"
|
| _Contacting the BBC_
|
| Mr Hall contacted the BBC Radio programme _You and Yours_
| (consumer affairs programme) and they confirmed this was a
| criminal offence, not a civil offence. (Comment from me: speaks a
| lot about the police that the owner ends going to a BBC Radio
| programme due to inactivity and incorrect information from police
| sources.)
|
| The BBC put Mr Hall in touch with the Bedford Fraud Squad who
| agree Mr Hall is a victim of fraud and is now investigating.
|
| _How did it happen?_
|
| The criminal contacts the solicitor and pretends to be Mr Hall.
| But how did the criminal convince the solicitor he was Mr Hall?
|
| Solicitors require identity documents e.g. Passport, Driving
| Licence (both include owner photo). The criminal applied for and
| got a genuine duplicate driver licence from the DVLA (Driver and
| Vehicle Licensing Agency) in Mr Hall's name ("genuine document
| fraudulently obtained").
|
| Mike Hall's driving licence is in Welsh and contains the title
| 'Reverend', his address, his photo and signature. The criminal's
| licence is in English, with the title 'Mr', a different address,
| signature and photo. This is the fraudulent driving licence the
| solicitor saw.
|
| _It gets worse..._
|
| In April 2021, the DVLA contacted Mike Hall to confirm if he had
| applied for a duplicate driving licence as they has a suspicion
| the request they had received could be fraudulent. Mike Hall
| confirmed to the DVLA he didn't apply for a duplicate licence.
| The DVLA said they would cancel the fraudulent request.
|
| Unfortunately, they failed to cancel the duplicate licence even
| though they promised they would.
|
| The criminal gets the genuine duplicate driving licence and
| changes the picture in the driving licence. The DVLA would not
| comment on how the criminal altered the driving licence details.
| However, they say they are taking this matter very seriously
| (they described what happened to Mike Hall as "awful") and are
| working with Bedfordshire Police.
|
| _Fraudulent bank account_
|
| In April, a new TSB bank account is fraudulently created in Mike
| Hall's name. In July, over two days, PS131,000 is deposited into
| the bank account - and then withdrawn. The BBC reporter contacted
| TSB to ask them: why did they not flag this as suspicious
| activity? TSB said the activity didn't trigger any suspicions and
| they are working with the police on the case.
|
| _Will Mike Hall get his house back?_
|
| Reporter: "Very possibly not"
|
| Reporter: "If your name is on the Land Register for a property,
| that property is yours and it doesn't matter if you bought that
| property from a fraudster."
|
| "The Land Registery is the only record of property ownership we
| have in the UK [England and Wales]. It is state guaranteed and
| that means if there is fraudlent change of title, which has
| happened in this case, victims of fraud and mistakes can be
| compensated."
|
| This type of fraud ("vendor fraud") is on the rise. Compensation
| has risen from PS2m to PS3.5m in just twelve months - a 40% rise.
|
| The Land Registry say they rely on solicitors to make checks to
| spot fraudulent attempts to impersonate property owners. Empty,
| rental and properties with no mortgages are particularly
| vulnerable to this type of fraud.
|
| _And what about Mike?_
|
| The BBC showed Mike the fake driving licence used to impersonate
| him: "I felt sick actually - seeing someone else's face on my
| driving licence...I felt an emptiness in my stomach and it make
| it all very real to me."
| design-of-homes wrote:
| Thanks for the summary. Everyone looks bad in this story: the
| police, the solictors, the DVLA, the bank, and finally the law
| itself which probably hasn't changed for decades if not longer.
|
| A law that says a home can be fraudlently sold to an (innocent)
| purchaser and thus confers ownership on the purchaser, while
| the original owner loses ownership is simply not fit for modern
| times. Even if Mike Hall receives compensation, he's still lost
| his home and the contents in the home.
|
| Will the compensation match the purchase price of the house and
| the contents in the home? And what of the innocent house buyer
| who bought the property? Surely it would make more sense to
| return the house to the original owner, and for compensation be
| paid to the house buyer.
| rkangel wrote:
| I have a friend who was almost the buyer of a house in the UK in
| a very similar situation. Fundamentally, it relied on the seller
| buying counterfeit identity documents (passport and driving
| licence) off the internet. That way, in theory, the identity
| checks were all conducted.
|
| There was the suggestion that the seller's solicitor was in on
| it, but no firm evidence. The seller has been arrested at least.
| iso1631 wrote:
| How did they find the house? Was it advertised through an
| estate agent?
| lbriner wrote:
| It's a shame that the systems that are really important, like
| passports, id cards, property registers etc. are all still so
| far behind in basic security. They could easily require certain
| info up-front on the title like mobile, photo etc. and then if
| you need to update it, you have to do it via a solicitor or
| equivalent, it's not like most people change their photo or
| mobile number every week.
| cletus wrote:
| Having gone through the purchase and sale of houses I'm honestly
| confused at how this happens. It involves a ton of paperwork,
| phone calls and in-person appointments, generally.
|
| If there is a mortgage on the property, the bank holds the title.
| The bank has a relationship with the owner. How did the bank sign
| off on the transfer of funds and title? They'd have to verify the
| identity of the seller.
|
| If there was no mortgage, at least in the US some bank normally
| holds onto the title on behalf of the owner so the same applies.
|
| There would need to be a settlement process where the sale
| proceeds (minus mortgage repayment) needs to be paid to the
| seller. What happened here?
|
| Being aware of the possibility of fraud, banks can and do make
| simple checks in my experience. A simple phone call with the
| contact details on record would've probably prevented this.
|
| In addition the Land Registry authorizing title transfer, the
| bank would have to be on the hook here too. It's a colossal screw
| up and a huge nightmare for the owner to deal with but I imagine
| restitution will be made.
|
| It sounds like he probably won't get his house back. I assume the
| buyer acted in good faith. It sure does suck though.
| whartung wrote:
| > Having gone through the purchase and sale of houses I'm
| honestly confused at how this happens. It involves a ton of
| paperwork, phone calls and in-person appointments, generally.
|
| It seems that this was sophisticated identity theft.
|
| If someone managed to get a DL with your name on it, but their
| picture, and your SSN, then it's pretty much carte blanche at
| that point.
|
| Go into a bank and say "I need to close my accounts". "What are
| the account numbers?" "Oh, golly, I forget -- here's my DL, my
| BDay is XX-YY-ZZZZ and my Social is 123-45-6789. I recently
| moved from 1234 Main St. to 4567 First Ave." "Of course sir,
| one moment." Next thing you know you're walking out with a
| check.
|
| And..that's it, it all comes from that. Buy a house, sell a
| house, request some documentation. Especially, since they're
| SELLING the house, they don't have to go through the rigors of
| a background check for the loan. The BUYERS are placed under a
| microscope. The sellers? "So, you got the key?" "Yea." "We're
| good, sign here."
|
| And it's noone's fault except the original perpetrator.
| Everyone else did "due diligence". If the questions were
| answered properly, showed appropriate ID, what more can they
| do?
| iso1631 wrote:
| It sucks that the bank has its money stolen in your scenario,
| but at least the person who the bank owes the money to (the
| real holder) doesn't lose anything.
| meltedcapacitor wrote:
| The fraudster probably picked a property with both an absentee
| owner and no mortgage for that reason.
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| I'm in the US. What I see is that stolen+sold property tends to
| belong to the original owner, not the purchaser. Is it different
| in the UK?
| so_throwaway wrote:
| It is not different in the UK. This person will get their house
| back when the Land Registry has ticked all the boxes.
|
| They were shocked by the reluctance of the police to enforce
| their property rights simply on their say-so. They were shocked
| by it because they hadn't really thought through how the system
| works. It is not the role of the police to evict someone who is
| the registered owner merely on the say-so of someone else who
| claims to have been defrauded. Clearly there are good reasons
| for this.
|
| The article presents the facts as though they will never get
| their house back (with some creative ambiguity about what
| 'legal owner' means - does it mean the legally registered
| owner, regardless of any past fraud? or the actual rightful
| owner) because it makes a more interesting article than 'Man
| left annoyed after a painstaking legal process restores him his
| property rights'.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| The key problem is that it is a civil matter. It's like a
| contract dispute - it's not a police matter. Obviously for the
| individual it's a major life-changing disaster... but in the
| eyes of the state it's equivalent to 'we ordered four cases of
| Coca-Cola but our vendor only delivered three'.
| krisoft wrote:
| > The key problem is that it is a civil matter.
|
| No. The criminal matter, as alleged, is that someone scammed
| the buyer, the solicitors and the Land Registry into
| believing that they are who they were not. That is not a
| civil matter, it is I believe fraud.
|
| If a bloke sells their house, but then gets cold feet, or not
| happy with the compensation that is a civil matter. This is
| not what is alleged.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| > The criminal matter, as alleged, is that someone scammed
| the buyer, the solicitors and the Land Registry
|
| Did you notice who you didn't list there?
|
| The home owner.
|
| The criminal issue doesn't involve him!
| krisoft wrote:
| > The criminal issue doesn't involve him!
|
| Of course it does. If it is as alleged, then the home
| owner and the new "owner" is equally victims of the
| crime.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| Maybe you know more about law in the UK than I, but I
| believe the criminal issue is between HM's Land Registry
| and the person who sold it, and there is only a civil
| issue between the rightful owner and anyone.
| pmyteh wrote:
| Criminal law in England and Wales is between the Crown
| (represented by a prosecutor, often but not always an arm
| of the state) and the alleged criminal. So the question
| 'who is the technical victim' isn't usually very
| interesting. The three salient questions here are:
|
| 1) Has the person committed an offence (probably yes:
| fraud by false representation, contrary to s.2 Fraud Act
| 2006);
|
| 2) Is there a reasonable prospect of conviction? (Who
| knows: will depend on the evidence); and
|
| 3) Is it in the public interest to prosecute? (Almost
| certainly yes).
|
| 'Who has been defrauded' doesn't even matter for
| establishing (1), only that the fraudster intended to
| make a gain for himself or a loss for someone else by
| making a false representation (in this case that he was
| the owner of the house). So in this case it really is a
| bit crappy from the police: if a fraud has been committed
| it doesn't in principle matter who complains about it,
| they should investigate (or at least register the crime)
| anyway.
| lbriner wrote:
| Yes, it is unclear why the police told him it was civil
| since fraud is "misrepresentation for a gain", which the
| fraudulent seller presumably did.
|
| Maybe the argument is that without proof that the
| fraudulent seller made a gain, it is merely a Tort and not
| Fraud?
| kube-system wrote:
| Because there are three parties, and only one of them
| committed a crime. The one who currently has the house
| and the one who lost the house have not -- their dispute
| is civil. The criminal was long gone by the time the
| police arrived.
| teawrecks wrote:
| They're referring to the parties at the house when the
| police were called. By all official accounts the house
| had been sold and the police couldn't find anyone to
| arrest.
| krisoft wrote:
| > it is unclear why the police told him it was civil
|
| It's just typical first level support. Police didn't see
| any obvious simple solution and wanted the issue out of
| their hair so they said the thing which usually gets the
| issue out of their hair. The person persisted and
| escalated the issue higher. (for example to the news
| papers.) And now "The BBC put Mr Hall in touch with
| Bedfordshire Police's fraud squad, which has begun an
| investigation."
| pmyteh wrote:
| I suspect the average PC called out to an argument
| between two seemingly innocent parties about ownership is
| going to want to get as far away from it as possible...
| rkangel wrote:
| Actually, in this case it should be both. It is a civil
| matter to get the house back, but obviously there was also
| some criminal fraud involved. The victim of the fraud though
| is presumably the land registry rather than the house owner.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| > It is a civil matter to get the house back
|
| Well that's what he cares about.
| Taniwha wrote:
| Well there's also all his belongings which also have been
| taken (and are not controlled by the land registry)
| rkangel wrote:
| Sure. But as a distant second place after having
| somewhere to live, I would also want the fraudster to go
| to prison. Assuming this article is correct, he was "told
| by the police they didn't believe a criminal offence had
| been committed here" which seems dumb.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| The home owner has not been scammed. The land registry
| and the buyer have been scammed.
| [deleted]
| klyrs wrote:
| I'm not sure the police would do anything different in the US.
| I'm guessing that proper owner, like most people, kept the deed
| in his house -- which was emptied of his belongings and sold.
| Without that, the police don't have much to act on.
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| In my state, original deeds are filed with the property
| appraiser's office. I suspect this is the case for all states
| but I do not know.
|
| Our PAO gives a receipt at filing. Copies are available after
| the deed is processed. In my state, they're public record; in
| my county, they're available online.
|
| source: worked for real estate attorney
| op00to wrote:
| Who keeps their deed in the house? When I bought my first
| house, my realtor basically steered us right into a bank to
| open a safe deposit box.
| klyrs wrote:
| Not saying it's the best of ideas (especially in light of
| this story), but I think that a lot of people do it.
| cortesoft wrote:
| I don't think most people in the US hold a physical deed. I
| know I certainly don't for my house.
| bogle wrote:
| In England the owner doesn't have the deeds, although they
| may obtain a copy. It's digital with the Land Registry.
| Scotland, incidentally, has the oldest land registry in the
| world (1617 CE), the Sasines.
| stevekemp wrote:
| I paid off my flat in Edinburgh back in 2016 or so, and in
| exchange I received a huge bundle of papers "the deeds",
| from the bank.
|
| I spent a fun evening flicking through the records of
| owners, the price they'd paid for it, and the few details
| provided (occupation, etc). All dating back to when the
| building was built in 1890 or so.
|
| Later I left the country, and moved to Finland. After a
| year or two here I wanted to sell the flat as I'd decided I
| wasn't going back. Despite going through the process of
| ensuring the registry was updated I had to mail them back
| to the solicators based in Scotland prior to selling the
| flat.
|
| The sale was carried out 100% remotely; I had a couple of
| phone calls, and when I balked at the use of a FAX machine
| I printed out a few forms/documents from emails, signed
| them, and physically posted them back to the solicators.
|
| Happily I'd had the foresight to leave a spare set of keys
| with a trusted friend, which were used for the viewings,
| etc. It probably helped that the solicator who handled the
| sale had also handled the registration of the deeds when I
| received them so they were probably confident it was a flat
| I owned..
|
| When I queried things I was told "The only registry is
| definitive, but .. things are .. smoother .. with the
| physical deeds". Made no sense to me, but I wasn't going to
| argue.
| iso1631 wrote:
| I bought my house in August, I've got original deeds for
| the land dating back to 1831 which was quite unusual to
| be holding the 200 year old paper.
| willyt wrote:
| When the land registry was digitised they got the land
| boundaries from the Ordnance Survey maps. The Ordnance
| Survey got them from tracing aerial photos. When property
| changes hands for the first time since the digital system
| was introduced the land boundaries from the OS mapping
| agency have to be checked against the original deeds as
| they are almost always slightly wrong, e.g my kitchen was
| shown as being partly in my neighbour's garden according
| to the digital map.
| quietbritishjim wrote:
| Paper deeds are no longer relevant to property ownership in
| the UK. The HM Land Registry records are authoritative
| (subject to legal challenges). See for example:
| https://hmlandregistry.blog.gov.uk/2018/02/19/title-deeds/
|
| Edit: technically they are still relevant if the property has
| not been sold since the records were digitised in the 1990s
| Maxburn wrote:
| In the US I believe your Title Insurance would give you a
| suitable paper trail as well. That and the registrar.
| staticman2 wrote:
| You need a court case to determine if it was stolen is
| presumably the issue.
|
| You don't want police running around "taking people's house
| back" without due process, presumbly.
| lbriner wrote:
| No, I think the issue is that police would have no power to
| "take the house back" because it was legally purchased. They
| could investigate the fraud committed by the seller against
| other organisations but specifically, the real owner is not
| the victim of criminal fraud.
|
| I don't think he will have any ablity to forceably reobtain
| the house, although potentially, if he refunded the buyers
| money (after getting it from the accused), they might agree
| to give it to him back. On the other hand, if already
| cleared, it would probably be easier for the real owner to
| get his money back and buy somewhere else.
|
| Very sad though.
| david-cako wrote:
| isn't there a Steve Martin movie about that
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