West Virginia couple loses $255K, life savings in real estate scam — how homebuyers can stay safe in 2025

After months of house-hunting, Raegan Bartlo and her husband finally found their dream home in a small West Virginia community just a few hours from Washington, D.C.

Bạn đang xem: West Virginia couple loses $255K, life savings in real estate scam — how homebuyers can stay safe in 2025

But that dream became a nightmare as a few days before the closing, Bartlo received an email she thought was from her title company. The email provided instructions on how to wire the money for closing. She wired the $255,000 down payment as per the email’s directions, ABC 7 reported.

• Accredited investors can become the landlord of Walmart, Whole Foods or Kroger — and benefit from regular distributions without lifting a finger. Here’s how

• Famed economist Larry Summers issues dire inflation warning to Americans after Trump’s White House win — 3 ways to help protect yourself in 2025

• These 5 magic money moves will boost you up America’s net worth ladder in 2024 — and you can complete each step within minutes. Here’s how

On closing day, she received another email saying her closing time had been moved. When she called her realtor to ask about the change, she received devastating news. The first email wasn’t from her title company — and that $255,000 down payment was now gone.

“At that point, my whole world fell apart because I had already wired all of the down payment money for our house,” Bartlo told ABC 7 News. “And that was about $255,000. And so our nest egg, our savings, everything at that moment was gone.”

Xem thêm : 3 Antique Items To Sell in 2025 To Boost Your Retirement Savings

Bartlo was a victim of real estate wiring fraud. This happens when scammers gain access to the email of a title company, mortgage company or realtor. They can see you’re due to send a large payment, so they email you to provide wiring instructions. However, those funds go to the scammer’s account.

“I just remember shaking a lot and not being able to think straight. To feel like everything you had saved for to be able to have financial stability was just taken,” Bartlo shared with ABC 7. “And what if I didn’t have a house? My mother lives with us. Where was she going to go? What were we going to do?”

It’s a story that Tom Cronkright, founder of CertifiED, a company that helps prevent wire fraud, said he hears every day. He started his company in 2015 after he lost $180,000 to a wire fraud scam.

“I see it happen daily, if not multiple times a day,” he told ABC 7. “The reality of it is these are some of the most sophisticated bad actors that have invested hundreds of millions of dollars into their own tradecraft.”

According to Cronkright, huge, global crime syndicates and cartels are often behind these scams. They hack into banks, real estate companies and law firms to gain information they can use to impersonate a trusted company or person. With that information in hand, they’re able to send realistic-looking emails that consumers often don’t question.

Story Continues