You’ve saved up for a down payment for a couple of years. You’ve looked at a dozen or more houses. You’ve gone through the loan approval process and much more. Finally, it’s all come together for you to close the deal in a couple of days.
When you receive instructions to wire your money to the escrow closing account, there are still a few moving parts left.
This is a time for extra caution on your part to avoid being tripped up by mortgage wire fraud.
Mortgage Wire Fraud Has Gone High Tech
It’s never a good idea to email your financial information to others, and this is especially true when large amounts of money are involved.
Although you might think your email is secure, email accounts are one of the easiest electronic communications methods to hack. Even if you are comfortable with the security of your email, you can never be sure about the email accounts of the others involved with closing your home purchase — not even professionals who you trust.
The most common mortgage wire fraud involves what is called “phishing.” The criminal hackers specifically target the email accounts of professionals in the real estate industry. Hackers are well aware that large amounts of money are involved in these transactions.
Once the account of a real estate professional is “hacked,” the criminal monitors messages for specific words and phrases like “closing,” “escrow” and “wire transfer.”