Mortgage & Deed Fraud Unit

The Unit was created to address the fraudulent transfer and mortgaging of property throughout the county of Wayne and focuses solely on the investigation of these types of crimes.  Over the years, criminals have discovered that they can prepare and record legitimate looking documents, forging the rightful owner's signature and transferring title to themselves. They then work with an unsuspecting or cooperative mortgage lenders and borrow against the property, all without the knowledge or consent of the rightful owner. This often happens when the rightful owner is elderly, has recently died or has moved to a nursing home. 

Usually, the criminal's method is to pull all the equity from the property at the closing, make no payments on the mortgage and the property goes into what is known in the industry as a first payment default. This will usually trigger a fraud investigation by the parent company of the mortgage lender and often a foreclosure action by the lender. 

The rightful owner, or their heirs or family members, only learn of what has taken place when they find foreclosure papers taped to the front door. Filing a civil lawsuit to stop the foreclosure and set aside the forged transfer is expensive; time consuming, and often only marginally cost effective. 

Each case is typically factually intensive and requires a great deal more investigative and prosecutorial time. 

Deed Fraud Hotline: (313) 224-5869.