There are two most popular schemes of fraud in the sale of real estate. This was stated in an interview with Izvestia by Alexander Sagin, a member of the board of the Moscow City Notary Chamber, on Thursday, January 13.
The first scheme is that a person signs a contract for the sale of housing for a lower price in order to evade taxes, but as a result he is paid an even smaller amount than promised.
Another option is that the person was not going to sell real estate, but he received a call allegedly from law enforcement agencies, they said that malefactors want to sell his apartment and he must sign an agreement so that law enforcement officers can catch the scammers. There are cases when citizens signed contracts and gave money allegedly to the police, remaining in the end without money.
Speaking about examples of digital fraud, Sagin said that, for example, in a video conference, a fraudster can act under the guise of another person. There were cases when citizens fell for these tricks, he lamented.
The notary emphasized that citizens are also accustomed to not looking at the contract that they sign on Internet resources, for example, a contract for the sale of real estate, if it is concluded online.
On January 12, market participants and lawyers told Izvestia that the number of scams with real estate and mortgage transactions increased by 6.5% over the year in Russia. They attributed this to a notable increase in distance selling.
The Prosecutor General’s Office said that in 2021, in January-November, 281.9 thousand cases of fraud were registered in the country (Article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). The number of fraudulent actions in the total mass, which were committed with the help of information technology, increased by 13.7%.
The increase in the number of crimes is associated, among other things, with the strengthening of the habit of citizens to remote service due to restrictions due to the pandemic, said Vladimir Sazonov, a member of the Moscow Union of Lawyers.
Source: IZ
Jane Stock is a technology author, who has written for 24 Hours World. She writes about the latest in technology news and trends, and is always on the lookout for new and innovative ways to improve his audience’s experience.
