The idea of having your home stolen and sold from under you may seem somewhat fantastical, but it does happen.
In fact, there was a case just a couple of weeks ago which hit the headlines.
Reverend Mike Hall only found out that something was amiss when his neighbours phoned him to alert him that building work had started on his property in Luton.
Hall had been working in Wales, but his identity had been stolen, with the scammer then selling the property on. When Hall arrived at the property, he found all of his furniture had been removed, with the new owner employing a builder to carry out renovations on the property.
Incredibly, the property is now legally owned by the person who bought it, though a police investigation is ongoing.
It isn’t a one-off either, yet it has emerged that a tiny number of homeowners are making use of a free scheme that offers a crucial element of protection against such property title fraud.
Registering with Land Registry
There is an incredibly simple way to give yourself some protection from this particular scam.
Back in 2014 the Land Registry set up an alert service, which means that you are contacted when land searches are carried out regarding a specific property.
These are the searches carried out by conveyancers ‒ the legal firms employed by buyers and sellers ‒ as part of a proposed property transaction.
If you know that you’re in the process of selling your home then you won’t be surprised to receive these alert notifications. They are all part and parcel of the process, after all.
But if you aren’t trying to sell your home and these alerts come through, then it’s a really useful warning that something is wrong. The alert system itself won't stop the scam taking place, but it can act as an alarm system.
The alert service is absolutely free to use, making it all the more appealing as a scam deterrent.
You can register up to 10 properties to track, and you don’t have to live in them either, meaning you can set up the alerts to keep an eye on properties owned by vulnerable relatives, for example.
Poor take-up
A free service that offers such important protection should be well valued by homeowners, or at least that’s what you might expect.
Yet only a tiny fraction of homeowners are making use of it.
A study by property tech firm Thirdfort found that since the alert system was established back in 2014, just 275,537 properties have been registered. For a nation of around 29 million properties, that’s a staggeringly poor take-up.
There are a couple of reasons why this may be. The first is quite simply awareness. How many people honestly know about the alert system, and crucially, how it could help protect them?
Clearly, a better job needs to be done in advertising the service, not just by the Land Registry but by the property industry as a whole. It’s in their interests, after all, for the sector to be as clear of property title fraud as possible.
There may also be the perception that signing up is fiddly, another job that will take ages to complete when people are already stretched for time.
The reality is that it took about three minutes for me to set up my own home on the alert system, and that included the time taken to register for an account on the Land Registry itself.
It’s free, it’s easy to use and it could protect you from fraudsters. It has to be worth doing.
Reducing risk
Of course, the alert isn’t the only way that you can reduce the chances of being caught out by property scammers like this.
Certain properties are more appealing to scammers, for example, those that are often empty or which are let out to tenants.
The fact that the actual owner may not always be present can make it a little easier for the scammers to step in and impersonate the actual owners, committing fraud along the way.
If you own a property that falls into those categories, then you need to think carefully about further defences against scammers. Being on friendly terms with the neighbours, who can inform you of anything out of the ordinary, is a good start.
Another type of property that’s particularly vulnerable are those which do not have a mortgage out against them.
There was a recent case where a woman changed her name by deed poll to match that of a property in Kensington and then posed as the owner of the property to apply for a bridging loan of more than £1 million.
While this was flagged as fraudulent once the application was made to the Land Registry ‒ meaning the real owner didn’t lose the property ‒ the fraudster had already managed to withdraw the money.
Recognising that your home may be more susceptible to these frauds puts you on the front foot in guarding against them.