We will analyze all the nuances that need to be taken into account when exchanging an apartment, and also consider ways to identify the criminal intentions of the participant in the transaction.
Types of apartment exchange fraud
The realtor often deliberately commits unlawful acts, offering the client an exchange of an apartment in Moscow. Any real estate fraud is a criminal offense. There is real responsibility for such unlawful acts.
For example, citizens wanted to exchange an apartment. Consider the situation. Very often, people who want to make the exchange of a 3-room apartment for housing of a smaller area are “on the street”. At the same time, the income of fraudsters is increasing sharply. There are cases when a one-room apartment in the capital causes the death of its owner.
Information on illegal actions in the field of real estate with an enviable frequency appears in the media, on various Internet resources.
Who are most often involved in real estate crimes?
Among such persons are realtors who are registered as individual entrepreneurs, or register firms to provide intermediary services with real estate. Such companies try to work according to one of several criminal schemes:
- the creation of "fake" companies with the registration of fake documents;
- periodic changes to the name of the company, description of the company;
- work through dummies, paperwork for strangers;
- work in several cities of the country;
- periodic changes to the appearance of their employees (possibly changing surnames, names, renewal of fake passports);
- the formation of a complex chain of sale of real estate to break the causal relationship.
Fraud Options
In addition to psychological tricks, scammers attract victims with interesting prices. Offering a profitable exchange, for example, such realtors convince the client that the municipal apartment can be exchanged for privatized housing with surcharge. Among the proposals that are difficult to refuse, and the purchase of real estate at prices significantly lower than the market value of housing. Ordinary citizens often fall into such fraudulent schemes, lose money, housing. In fact, a municipal apartment cannot be exchanged without the permission of the owner, that is, the municipal government.
Exchange on fake documents
This type of fraud is significant. Fraudsters illegally receive all the documentation necessary for the exchange: fake forms, certificates of ownership of real estate, technical passports of housing. After the exchange transaction is completed, during the check-in it turns out that there are other residents in the apartment who do not even suspect that their property was exchanged. The only way to resolve the situation would be to go to court. In the course of the trial, the authenticity of the documents, according to which a transaction was concluded, according to which, for example, a one-room apartment was exchanged for housing of a larger area, is ascertained. If it turns out that the documents were fake, deceived citizens are trying to return the lost money, return their old apartment.Practice shows that fraudsters spend about 100,000 US dollars on the manufacture of fake stamps, seals, registration documents for real estate.
Repeated exchange of one property
Often, a privatized apartment is exchanged by scammers 5-6 times, while fake duplicate documents are used by criminals. One package of fake documents is shown to the first person with whom the exchange is made. The owner of the apartment is invited to arrange for the exchange of real estate, receives (if it is assumed in the contract) the amount of money for the exchange. Next, they make copies of the documents and use them for the following illegal transactions.
Fraudsters receive money for the exchange of apartments according to the following scheme: the first part immediately after the conclusion of the contract (advance payment), the second part is offered to the citizen to pay after registration of the object in state authorities. Trusting people do not think that they are dealing with scammers, especially since the entire amount of the fee for helping with the exchange is not paid right away. As long as the deceived people realize that they have become victims of the deceivers, they can no longer be found.
Real Estate Substitution Options
In many cases, scammers offer to exchange one apartment, but in the end it turns out that the contract is executed on another property. Trusting buyers do not even try to verify the correctness of filling out documents, trying to “crank out” a profitable exchange of apartments as soon as possible, and do not pay attention to the fact that the contract indicates a completely different address, and not the one at which they carried out a preliminary inspection of the apartment. There is nothing surprising in this, because fraudsters skillfully use the confidence of customers, trying to extract their own material benefit from this.
Exchange of an apartment after the death of its owner
There are such situations that the exchange of apartments is performed after the death of the official owner. For the period of the transaction on the exchange of real estate, its owner is already dead, and it is his data that appears in the exchange agreement. Of course, such transactions are not legal, and the right to own an apartment is obtained by direct heirs.
Housing exchange with people who have not signed up
This fraudulent scheme is considered complex. It is used in situations when a person who is recognized as incapable of work or who has health problems lives in the apartment. A person recognized by the MES Bureau as incapable of work, living in an apartment, automatically receives rights to it. When conducting an exchange, an official consent must be obtained from such a person, and his rights should not be infringed or violated. 4-5 of these transactions give fraudsters the opportunity to live comfortably outside the country. In the worst case, a person with a disability appears on the street, cannot protect his rights in court, return the lost property. In the best case, the person after the exchange will be in a communal apartment, or he will be taken outside the city.
Exchange with understating the real value of the apartment
If during the exchange there is a significant underestimation of the market price of the apartment, this is done in order to avoid official taxes. To get out of this situation, it is important to go to court as soon as possible and find an experienced lawyer. Those realtors who choose this option of work are cynical, do not hide their impudence, are ready to expose their client not in the best light. The buyer receives during the exchange only the amount specified in the contract, in reality he pays much more. The risk of losing an apartment rather than the planned exchange of real estate is high. Fraudsters pay the difference between the cost of apartments in parts, there is no guarantee that their size will be full.
Fraud in exchange for Avito
This site is considered one of the most visited, and therefore it often appears on the exchange offers from swindlers.High-quality photographs, attractive terms of exchange - a trap in which gullible customers fall, dreaming of improving their living conditions. If the owner of the apartment offering the exchange is located outside the country, do not continue to cooperate with him. It is unlikely that the exchange transaction will be “clean” and beneficial to the client. The site has no restrictions on the placement of photographs, a description of the housing offered for exchange, and scammers use this. They post pictures that have nothing to do with the real apartment offered for exchange. Do not know how to exchange an apartment so that everything is legally competent? Look for a good lawyer, do not buy dubious offers.
View money exchange options
This scheme is developed in large cities, is considered the safest and most harmless. A realtor offers clients, for a certain amount of money, viewing an apartment for exchange. Such presentations continue until the actual sale or exchange of this property. The intermediary disappears, it is not possible to return money for viewing. Personally meet with the person offering the exchange, be sure to invite an experienced lawyer to the meeting. Before signing the documents, carefully study them, check the correspondence between the actual address at which you contacted and the address that is recorded in the contract. If any discrepancy is identified, immediately refuse to sign a real estate exchange agreement.
