CLEVELAND — Imagine waking up to find out your house is no longer yours.

It’s a nightmare Ramon Gordon has been living for five years after he said he learned through an online search that three of his properties had been sold without his knowledge.

Gordon said that in 2019, he learned that someone had sold his rental properties without his knowledge to a Miami-based LLC. It’s money he’s never seen from a seller he’s never met.

“I woke up one morning and my houses were made from my name,” he said. “It’s been hell.”

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Since then, Gordon has only been able to get one of the three properties back and has spent over $30,000 trying to get them all back.

Let’s Talk About Quit Claim Deeds and Deed Theft

Experts say it’s a crime that’s happening more often. Scammers forge documents and transfer assets to someone else with the goal of selling them quickly and making a profit.

“I don’t think anyone saw this coming,” said Brian O’Malley, director of Cuyahoga County Real Estate Services.
“It’s slowly accelerating.”

O’Malley said the crime began to emerge after the subprime mortgage financial crisis of 2008, when vacant homes were foreclosed on and sat empty for years, and the situation gradually got worse.

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“As a lot of these properties fell through the cracks of this whole crisis, I think the criminals saw an opportunity,” he said.

He said his office now sees several cases of suspected deed theft each month.

News 5 began reporting on the fraudulent acts four years ago.

3 men accused of falsifying documents to steal, sell homes in Cleveland, Garfield Heights

RELATED: 3 men accused of falsifying documents to steal, sell homes in Cleveland, Garfield Heights

In Gordon’s case, that owner said he lost his properties as a result of quitclaim deeds, a simple legal document often used to transfer property between family members or in a divorce.

Gordon showed News 5 copies of the fraudulent deeds, with signatures that did not match his personal signature.

Cleveland police filed charges twice, but the charges were ultimately dropped. Civil proceedings are pending.

At Cuyahoga County Real Estate Services offices, O’Malley admitted that even with new security levels instituted last year, it can be difficult to spot a fraudulent signature.

“The problem I have is that my staff is not expert in writing,” he said. “It all comes down to a signature. They should be comparing signatures. We process 50,000 transfers a year, recording over 200,000 documents. There is no way they have the training or ability to (question a signature.) And we wouldn’t have the legal authority to do anything about it either.

O’Malley told News 5 they have added new layers of security over the past year, including no longer accepting handwritten deeds and requesting additional documents such as settlement statements.

“I use the electric fence analogy: Every time we perfect it, they discover another weakness,” O’Malley said. “I feel bad because I want to do more in our role as auditor and secretary. But at some point, it’s the legislature that has to step in.”

How crime evolved (no, we’re not going to tell you exactly how to do it yourself)

Currently, O’Malley said they are facing issues in which notary stamps are easily tampered with, stolen or used without the notary’s knowledge, a check and balance meant to protect the integrity of the signature of an individual.

O’Malley admitted that the crime is incredibly easy to commit.

“Before, you had to find a notary to break the law and legalize the forgery,” O’Malley explained. “Now people just go (online) and order stamps with other people’s information.”

News 5 has learned the steps a criminal should take to commit notary forgery.

Without disclosing the exact crime manual, News 5 can confirm that this reporter was able to recreate the crime in four minutes. The simulated crime was carried out by easily locating a notary’s information and purchasing a stamp with their information online, all entirely without the notary’s knowledge.

RELATED: Here’s how someone could easily steal your real estate property – and what you can do to prevent it.

Here’s how someone could easily steal your real estate property – and what you can do to prevent it.

“There should be some sort of (process) to confirm that I’m notarizing this document and confirm (that) I am me,” O’Malley added.

In Ramon Gordon’s case, these fraudulent acts were notarized using a stamp that records show was invalid, having expired a year earlier.

“It’s too easy,” Gordon said. “They stole three properties.”

What you can *and should* do about it

Most counties in Ohio offer free real estate alerts, which notify property owners whenever your personal name or entity name is used in a real estate filing in the county.

“It’s completely free and protects your property.” » said O’Malley. “Sometimes time is of the essence. It’s best to take care of it right away.”

O’Malley also allayed some landlord concerns about the type of properties often targeted.

“I would say 90% of the victims are rentals or empty houses.” » said O’Malley. “If you live in your house, they won’t target you because you’ll know right away. There’s gas bills, electric bills, there’s so much going on. The houses they’re looking for are empty or the owner is deceased.

To learn more about real estate alerts in Cuyahoga County, Click here.

Clay LePard is a special projects reporter at News 5 Cleveland. Follow him on Twitter @ClayLePard or on Facebook Clay LePard News 5.

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