Before sending any funds for a closing, call us at 724-733-7700, dialed from this page or your commitment rather than from a number in an email, and confirm the wire instructions verbally.
How the fraud works
Criminals compromise or convincingly imitate an email account involved in a transaction (an agent's, a lender's, a buyer's, sometimes a settlement company's), then send revised wire instructions days or hours before closing. The message looks right: correct file number, correct names, familiar tone, a plausible reason for the change. The account it points to is theirs, and money that lands there moves offshore quickly.
Rules for buyers and sellers
- Treat every emailed change to wire instructions as fraud. We will never change our instructions by email. If instructions change, the change isn't real until you've confirmed it with us by phone.
- Verify by phone before the first wire, too. Call 724-733-7700 and read the account details back to us before your bank sends anything.
- Use known phone numbers only: from this website or your title commitment, never from an email signature, which fraudsters control in a compromised thread.
- Slow down on deadline pressure. Urgency is the tell. A legitimate closing survives a two-minute verification call; a fraud rarely does.
- Confirm receipt after sending. Call us to confirm the funds arrived where they should have.
What we do on every file
- Settlement funds are held in separate, federally insured fiduciary accounts, reconciled daily.
- Positive Pay on disbursement accounts and dual authorization on large wires.
- Verbal callback verification on every payoff and disbursement wire instruction we receive; we apply the same rule to ourselves that we ask of you.
- Closing traffic runs on our own email tenancy, separate from any other business.
If you think something went wrong
Minutes matter more than anything else. In order:
- Call your bank and ask for the wire department to request a recall and freeze on the receiving account.
- Call us at 724-733-7700 so we can act on the file immediately.
- Report to the FBI at ic3.gov. Rapid reporting through IC3 has recovered funds when started within the first 24–48 hours.
After closing: sign up for your county’s deed alert
Wire fraud isn’t the only scheme aimed at your property. In deed fraud, someone records a forged deed or mortgage against a home you already own, often one that’s paid off, and you may not find out until much later. Most Western Pennsylvania counties now offer a free alert service that emails you whenever a document is recorded in your name or against your parcel. It takes a few minutes to sign up, and we recommend it to every buyer after closing:
- Westmoreland County: sign up for AlertMe through the Recorder of Deeds.
- Allegheny County: sign up for Property Fraud Alert at pfa.uslandrecords.com.
- Butler County: click the AlertMe icon on the Recorder of Deeds public access site.
- Washington County: sign up for the Record Alert at landex.com/recordalert.
- Beaver County: no alert service yet. You can review your recorded documents anytime through the Recorder of Deeds.
- Armstrong County: sign up for the Record Alert System at landex.com/recordalert.
- Indiana County: sign up for Property Alert at indiana.pa.publicsearch.us.
- Fayette County: Fraud Guard, launching soon through the Recorder of Deeds.
These services notify you after a document records; they don’t block a fraudulent filing. If you get an alert you don’t recognize, call the Recorder’s office, local law enforcement, and us.
The mail you’ll get after closing, and what to ignore
Recorded deeds are public record, and within weeks of closing that record gets harvested by mailing operations. Nearly every new owner receives some of the following. None of it comes from us, your lender, or the county:
- “Property records” deed letters. An official-looking letter, often with a Harrisburg return address and a name like “Property Records” or “Records Retrieval,” offering a “certified copy” of your deed and a “property profile” for $90–$110. The Recorder of Deeds sells certified copies for a few dollars, and you don’t need one anyway: your original recorded deed comes to you after closing, and we can provide a copy anytime, free. The fine print on these letters admits they’re not a government agency and you owe nothing. Throw them away.
- “Final notice” home-warranty letters. Urgent-looking mail claiming your home warranty is “expiring” and payment is due to avoid a lapse, often on a home that never had a warranty. It’s a solicitation dressed as a bill.
- Mortgage-protection insurance mailers. These cite your actual lender and loan amount, pulled from the public record rather than from anyone involved in your closing, to look like they’re from your bank. They’re selling insurance you didn’t ask for.
The rule of thumb: real correspondence about your closing comes from us, your lender, your realtor, or the county; none of them will demand a fee by return mail to “protect” your deed. If a letter makes you unsure, call us at 724-733-7700 and we’ll tell you what it is. The Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Bureau of Consumer Protection takes complaints about these mailings at 1-800-441-2555.