Possible fraud?

keith969

Hi, long time since I posted but I could do with some advice here.

My sister died recently, and to cut a long story short in her will my brother
was declared the executor and her son the sole beneficiary. She lived alone, her
husband haveing died about 15 years ago, in a house she paid for in cash in
2006.

While checking on RightMove to see what sort of figures houses were selling for
in her street, we discovered something unusual. Her house was showing as sold in
2006 for £92K as we expected, but the same address was shown as sold in 2010 for
£110K. This was weird as she'd never mentioned anything like this to her family.

She lived at the address until her death. I have been through bank accounts and
can find no record of any payment of rent or similar. There is evidence of about
£10K being transferred to her bank acount in 2010 around the time of the sale,
but no sign of the expected amount.

Land registry info we have obtained shows that it was sold to a couple we do not
know, and do not believe she knew either. The mortgage company they used is one
that deals exclusively in BTL properties.

The 'witness' of her signature is someone from a property company which seems to
have been dissolved; googling the owner's name reveals his brother also has a
string of property management companies that have been dissolved.

The solicitor who handled her sale is again someone unknown in a location far
away from where she lived, and not her local solicitor.

So we are puzzled.

- Why did she sell the house, and seem to only get £10K for it when it was sold
for £110K?

- Why did she continue to live there for over 2 years? She kept up the house
insurance but there is no sign of any payment of rent or a tenancy agreement.

- There is no paperwork as far as we can see about the sale, or anything to do
with the supposed legal owners. And as yet they have not attempted contact.

- There is no evidence she had money problems - the house was bought for cash,
she had a pension income of about £1000/month and had no direct debits apart
from house insurance at about £15/month. She didn't run a car or have an
extravagent lifestyle.

Her solicitor thinks a fraud might have been committed, and has advised us not
to approach any of the people mentioned in the transfer document directly in
case they bury evidence. I'm curious if there is some kind of property scam in
existance that she may have been caught in.

RAS

Speak to the Land Registry in the morning (and maybe pm the LR representative who posts on here most days?)

keith969

Thanks, but we have the Land Registry documents already. Our solicitor is trying to get the case documents from the solicitor who acted for her in the sale. This seems to be taking some time, and I do worry that they may be in the pocket of the property company who arranged the sale (i.e. the one which witnessed her signature on the transfer document).

Fire_Fox

Worried about what? Either the transaction is legal and above board and there is a reasonable explanation or it is not. If the conveyancers are dodgy they risk being struck off or done for fraud. There is only so much covering tracks that can be done.

societys_child

Fire_Fox wrote: »

Worried about what?

Are you serious?

Loopgames

Sorry for your loss..

I presume this is an elderly lady we are talking about. The thing that jumps up is that she may have sold it to an equity release company. But that doesn't explain the missing £100k. It could be some dodgy agreement indeed. Very strange.

They could have pocketed the money in exchange for living in it rent free for the rest of her life. All amatuer speculation.

Or she could have another account you are unaware of.

Fire_Fox

societys_child wrote: »

Are you serious?

Yep: the transaction is done and dusted and is either legitimate or fraudulent. Knowing whether the solicitors were involved in a scam or not does not change the legitimacy of the transaction, it's the same nightmare task to pick the case apart and reverse it regardless.

It matters to any criminal prosecution how many dodgy f*ck*rs are involved, if any. Might even be better to have crook solicitors still in business, they have assets that can be frozen and people that can be arrested and interviewed. Apparently the property company is long gone and perhaps the witness.

I'd be a lot more worried if possibly dodgy solicitors had tens of thousands of my money in cash, it's a lot easier to run off with that than a house.

Hillbilly1

Fire_Fox wrote: »

Yep: the transaction is done and dusted and is either legitimate or fraudulent. Knowing whether the solicitors were involved in a scam or not does not change the legitimacy of the transaction, it's the same nightmare task to pick the case apart and reverse it regardless.

It matters to any criminal prosecution how many dodgy f*ck*rs are involved, if any. Might even be better to have crook solicitors still in business, they have assets that can be frozen and people that can be arrested and interviewed. Apparently the property company is long gone and perhaps the witness.

I'd be a lot more worried if possibly dodgy solicitors had tens of thousands of my money in cash, it's a lot easier to run off with that than a house.

And if this is fraud then someone somewhere has tens of thousands of someone elses cash... just thank god this time it isn't you.

OP I would be worried and would want to investigate further to ensure all has been above board. It is difficult with elderly relatives, especially when this seems out of character.

Please keep us posted. If it is dodgy these things are rarely a one off.

Nan_Dingle

Sheesh, what a bummer to find the inheritance is in the toilet.

Could the old dear have stashed the cash in the house? Elders don't trust banks and also maybe thought that was the easiest way of 'hiding' the sale proceeds if she was on means-tested benefits.

Did she have any reason to think she only had two years to live, or could she have expected to have many years in the house, poss. rent free?

Any 'difficult' reason why she had no desire to leave any inheritance to the family?

Had she started to show signs of loss of mental faculties etc in 2010?

Obviously this is family, but could the son have already spend it? Has he been in trouble? Failed business?

Has your solicitor any ideas on blocking the supposed owner simply turning up to take possession of 'their' house?

societys_child

Fire_Fox wrote: »

Yep: the transaction is done and dusted and is either legitimate or fraudulent. Knowing whether the solicitors were involved in a scam or not does not change the legitimacy of the transaction, it's the same nightmare task to pick the case apart and reverse it regardless.

It matters to any criminal prosecution how many dodgy f*ck*rs are involved, if any. Might even be better to have crook solicitors still in business, they have assets that can be frozen and people that can be arrested and interviewed. Apparently the property company is long gone and perhaps the witness.

I'd be a lot more worried if possibly dodgy solicitors had tens of thousands of my money in cash, it's a lot easier to run off with that than a house.

Exactly, there appears to 100k missing and the property belongs to someone else. I'd call that worrying.

Fire_Fox

Hillbilly1 wrote: »

And if this is fraud then someone somewhere has tens of thousands of someone elses cash... just thank god this time it isn't you.

OP I would be worried and would want to investigate further to ensure all has been above board. It is difficult with elderly relatives, especially when this seems out of character.

Please keep us posted. If it is dodgy these things are rarely a one off.

Not necessarily. If the owner thought she had sold the house for something approaching its market value they would likely have complained about only receiving £10K! If they didn't know the house had been sold but only done equity release for a percentage, say, then the entire transaction is fraudulent and it's the house you want back not the cash. It appears the cash was stumped up by a BTL mortgage company, might be them that lose out.