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221 Cannon is Not For Sale

fredbenenson.com

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Re: 221 Cannon is Not For Sale

#171

Post by skissane »

bluGill wrote: post #51
wrs wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s turtles all the way down, though — how do you know that last deal had clear title? At some point you’re going to want insurance anyway. In any case, the US system is already that the government records ownership (not for free, but for a small recording fee) and the title company charges for checking, and for insurance in case they get it wrong. As just one example of how it can go wrong, here in Seattle it’s com…

That depends on the state. I live in Iowa where the state records the transaction and verifies everyone's identity. Almost nobody has title insurance because there is nothing to insure. Every other state I've lived in though isn't as good about checking ID and you need title insurance (who is very good about checking id)

The system in Iowa, is instead of getting title insurance from a private insurer (as is standard in the US), you get it from a state government agency (Iowa Title Guaranty) which has a legal monopoly on all title insurance in the state. But people in Iowa say they don't have "title insurance", because the term is defined to mean private insurance, not the insurance issued by the state government. A condition of the state-issued title insurance is you need to provide an attorney's legal opinion that there are no issues with the title, and then the insurance covers the risk the attorney did a bad job, or failed to notice some obscure issue or hidden issue. But this is different from a true Torrens title system, in that title registration is not (near-)conclusive evidence of legal title, only de facto presumptive.

A number of US states historically had Torrens title, but most have repealed it, effectively converting Torrens titles to non-Torrens. Illinois had it – only in Cook County – until it was repealed in 1992. California abolished it in 1955. Virginia abolished it in 2019. Washington state abolished it in 2022-2023.

The big advantage of Torrens title is that it eliminates the need for title insurance, or at least makes it much cheaper. (You can still buy title insurance in Australia, but the Torrens title system significantly reduces the risk to the insurer, resulting in lower premiums–the risk it is covering is not that you don't have title to the property at all, rather risks such as the boundary fences being in the wrong places.) But in those US states which had it, title insurers wouldn't give you any discount for having it, and banks would still insist on title insurance to lend, nullifying the primary practical advantage of the Torrens system–the end result was your property was under a different title system which many didn't understand, which could make real estate transactions appear more complex, discourage buyers and lenders, etc. This resulted in political pressure from landowners on the system to be allowed to move off it, which is what resulted in it being repealed.

I think the US state in which Torrens would be most likely to be successful would be Iowa, since private title insurance is banned there. However, repeated attempts to introduce Torrens in Iowa failed, because the attorneys who investigate the validity of titles saw it as a threat to their livelihoods, and they successfully lobbied the state legislature against the idea.

Re: 221 Cannon is Not For Sale

#172

Post by phendrenad2 »

WillPostForFood wrote: post #91
IhateAI wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmm, I guess you technically just need to convince a notary that you're the seller and with virtual closings/ mobile notaries I guess that's probably pretty easy. But still the scammer would never see the earnest money, unless the buyer backed out outside of an option period for whatever reason. Presumably they wouldn't if the land is cheap, and they've agreed to pay cash and put earnest money down.

The scammer isn't trying to get the earnest money, they are trying to get the full sale price.

Is there a single case of the scammer getting a single dollar from one of these scams? My suspicion is that there isn't. (Everyone who doesn't know the answer and isn't curious should downvote me.)

Re: 221 Cannon is Not For Sale

#173

Post by tgsovlerkhgsel »

What's unclear to me from the blog post is whether this is a problem for the property owner, or only for the buyers/attorneys/relators/insurances involved on the other side of the scam?

It seems like in most cases the scammer pockets the earnest money deposit and that's it, in some cases, the buyer thinks they actually bought the property but they haven't actually (how does that work in terms of the deed?)

Seems like the worst case outcome for vacant land is "free house"?

Edit: based on the comments, the problem for the property owner is the headache and cost associated with cleaning the mess up. You don't lose the property but a fraudulent title change (?) can actually end up in the registry, which can be cleaned up but is a major PITA.

Re: 221 Cannon is Not For Sale

#174

Post by tgsovlerkhgsel »

avidiax wrote: post #146
kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #135

Since you've discovered law enforcement isn't interested in enforcing the law, you need to set up your own sting and get the scammer to show up where you can arrest them after they commit a crime in your presence.

The scammer will show up to a bar in Bucharest. They are probably not even legally allowed in the U.S. None of this scam requires the scammer to be in the U.S. Even the New York driver's license, even if it is real, could be muled. More likely it is just a photoshop. And even if they do show up to the meet, what are you going to do? Call the police? Will they even show up quickly? When they do, whose photo ID will th…

A relatively obvious photoshop, unless the date of issue is printed diagonally on genuine ones.

Re: 221 Cannon is Not For Sale

#175

Post by dghlsakjg »

happyopossum wrote: post #143
pixl97 wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Texas about a decade ago there was a criminal enterprise out of Houston that was putting swimmers on gas station pumps all over the state. Little towns, big towns, country gas stations. My now wife got hit that way.

Swimming at a gas station pump would be uncomfortably lethal.

I wonder how well you would have to be able to swim to overcome the density/buoyancy difference if swimming in a pool of gasoline?

Re: 221 Cannon is Not For Sale

#176

Post by jandrewrogers »

bigstrat2003 wrote: post #109
recursive wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You must have been going to some very shady restaurants. I still hand off my credit card to a rando. I did it today. I did it last weekend. I've never had this problem.

Yeah I agree. Not only do I hand off my card, literally everyone I know does so. None have ever had problems. I'm not saying that such fraud never happens, because it obviously does happen. But I don't think it's so overwhelmingly common as is being claimed here.

In my lifetime, I had my card details stolen once (in Washington DC). It was an American Express. They caught it immediately and shipped me a new card before I even noticed.

It was basically “we caught some shady shit, here is your new card number, which will be delivered today”. It is one of the reasons I like Amex. They are johnny-on-the-spot when they get a sniff of fraud.

Re: 221 Cannon is Not For Sale

#177

Post by skissane »

pdonis wrote: post #98
rcxdude wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the Torrens system, if you do not register the transfer of property with the government, then the transfer hasn't happened . So whatever else happens in the rest of the world doesn't matter (at least, unless the land itself is annexed by another government). (And, from similar cases in the UK which has this system, if the land registry fucks up the transfer is still final and this has been upheld by the court, the…

> In the Torrens system, if you do not register the transfer of property with the government, then the transfer hasn't happened. This is also true of county clerks in the US: any transfer of property in the county has to be recorded on a deed that is submitted to the county clerk and kept on file by them. Otherwise it hasn't happened. > if the land registry fucks up the transfer is still final This is the part that m…

> This is the part that might not be the same in all US jurisdictions (though it appears it is the same in some, someone posted upthread about Iowa having a system like this).

As I pointed out in a reply to that comment, that's a popular misconception – legally, Iowa uses essentially the same land title system as every other US state; the main difference is instead of private title insurance, there is a state government monopoly on title insurance. But Iowans use the phrase "title insurance" to mean "private title insurance", making many of them wrongly think their state doesn't have title insurance at all.

Several US states previously enacted Torrens title, but largely unsuccessfully – few titles were ever converted to Torrens, and in almost all of them Torrens title is either repealed or effectively moribund.

The only place under US jurisdiction where Torrens title is fully mainstream, is Guam. Guam adopted it in the early 20th century, around the same time as the US territories of Hawaii and the Philippines did. It survived in the Philippines, but the Philippines became an independent country. In Hawaii, it was successful in a few parts of the state (in particular Lānaʻi), but otherwise largely not.

Re: 221 Cannon is Not For Sale

#178

Post by bsder »

emptybits wrote: post #7

1. Author lost me at his first sentence: "Like most people, I’ve had my identity stolen once or twice in my life." I am careful and aware of this possibility, but AFAIK I have not experienced this, nor have "most people" I know. o_O Crazy times. 2. I don't even understand how a title transfer could happen without verifying ownership. Is the title system in the USA decentralized or that much different than elsewhere?…

> I don't even understand how a title transfer could happen without verifying ownership.

Centralized vs decentralized isn't relevant.

The issue is that nobody wants to have one of the icky humans in the loop because they have the temerity to ask to be paid a salary.

Consequently, everybody tries to set up systems where everything can be done online with no in-person interactions ever required. This works, sorta, until the fraudsters start figuring out the seams.

But because you would have to give some icky human cash, everybody is fighting tooth and nail to revert back to having any humans moderating the problems.

The correct solution is to call this kind of thing what it is--fraud--and treat it as such. And the proper point for the liability are the companies and agencies that do nothing to prevent the fraud and not all the poor slobs.

A couple of nice big payouts where banks or agencies have to cough up to make everybody whole due to their negligence and suddenly all the systems will get much more stringent.

Re: 221 Cannon is Not For Sale

#179

Post by m464 »

m463 wrote: post #163
kstrauser wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the dark old days before Apple Pay, where it was common in America to hand your credit/debit card to some rando at a restaurant and have them disappear with it for a few minutes, about once a year my bank would call me to ask if I'd been using my card in some far-off locale: "Hi! Are you in Tijuana?" "Not since 1993. Why? What's up?" "So you didn't just try to buy gasoline at a PEMEX there?" "Nope, I'm in San Fran…

I think tap-to-pay terminals that the server carries now eliminate more of this. but occasionally I have to give my card over. On the other hand, stolen credit cards were kept by the restaurant and they got a reward. Nowadays I don't think there is ANY checking of whose card is being used.

That you know of

Re: 221 Cannon is Not For Sale

#180

Post by swiftcoder »

dandelany wrote: post #125
dizhn wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Leaked? Isn't it used in the open basically like for everything including student IDs?

This was once common but is exceedingly rare these days. I'm sure exceptions exist, but nearly all Americans now treat this as a Very Secret Number.

> nearly all Americans now treat this as a Very Secret Number

I don't think that they actually do in practice. Last time I opened an account with Comcast they required your social security number. Same with an AT&T cell plan.

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