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By Nashville Indiana Title Company
The Wire Instructions in Your Inbox That Weren't From Us The email looks right. It has your file number in the subject line, our name near the top, mayb...
The email looks right. It has your file number in the subject line, our name near the top, maybe even a little note that sounds like something we'd say. It arrives a day or two before closing, right when you're expecting to hear from us about where to send your funds. And it tells you the wiring instructions have "changed" or "been updated," with a new account number to use instead.
That email did not come from us.
We want you to slow down the moment any wire instructions land in your inbox, even ones that look like they came from our office on the Nashville square. The reason is simple. Wire fraud in real estate almost always works by imitation, not by breaking in. Someone watches an email thread, learns the language of a closing, and slips in at the exact moment money is about to move. You're busy, the timing lines up, and the ask feels routine. That's the whole trick.
Nobody hacks a vault. What happens is far quieter. A scammer gains access to an email account somewhere in the transaction... a buyer's inbox, an agent's, sometimes a lender's... and simply watches. They read the back and forth. They see the closing date approaching. They learn your file number and the names of everyone involved.
Then, near the finish line, they send an email that mimics the real one. It might come from an address that's one letter off from ours. It might spoof our display name so it reads correctly on your phone even though the underlying address is wrong. The message usually carries a small sense of momentum: instructions have been updated, please use the new details, confirm once sent.
The money you're wiring to close on a cabin near Brown County State Park or a wooded lot off Salt Creek is often the largest single transfer of your life. That's exactly why it draws this kind of attention. The Federal Bureau of Investigation tracks these losses, and real estate wire fraud remains one of the most reported categories. You can read more about how these scams operate and what to watch for at the FBI's guidance on business email compromise.
Here's the part worth committing to memory. Once we give you wiring instructions for your closing, they do not change. We are not going to email you a day before closing with a brand new account number and a request to use it instead. If you ever receive a message that says our instructions have changed, treat that as your signal to stop, not to act.
We know how a legitimate wire should be set up, and we set it up once, clearly, on our terms. We use a separate account for each transaction, which means the details you receive are specific to your file and issued deliberately. A last minute "correction" simply is not how we do this.
Before you send a single dollar, call us. Not the number in the email... the number you already have from earlier in your closing, the one on our website, or the one you'd dial if you walked into our office. Read the account details back to us and let us confirm them out loud.
This one habit stops nearly every version of this scheme cold. A scammer can copy our logo and mimic our tone. What they can't do is answer our phone. When you call the number you trust and confirm the account, the fake email loses all its power. It becomes just another message you delete.
We would rather take that call fifty times than have you skip it once. There is no such thing as bothering us with a wire verification. Ask us anything, twice if you want. Read us the routing number digit by digit. We will happily sit on the phone while you do it.
Part of what makes the fake email convincing is that the timing feels plausible. You're expecting instructions, and one shows up. So it helps to know the rhythm of the real thing.
We provide your wiring details as part of getting your funds ready to close, and we do it directly and clearly. If something about the amount or timing genuinely needs to change, that conversation happens with a real person you've already been working with, confirmed by phone, never through a surprise email with a fresh account number attached. Wires also take time to land, so we want your funds sent early enough to settle before you sit down at the table. A message pushing you to wire immediately to a new account, right now, before you can confirm, is running against how a careful closing actually moves.
You know the feeling when an email is almost right but slightly not. Maybe the greeting is a little formal. Maybe the account is at a bank you've never heard us mention. Maybe it just arrived at an odd hour. That small hesitation is doing its job. Listen to it.
Call us. Forward us the suspicious message so we can look at it. If you've already sent a wire and then started to worry, call us and your bank immediately, because the first hours matter most when trying to halt a transfer. Acting fast gives you the best chance.
We've been handling closings in Brown County for years, and protecting the money that moves through them is part of what we do at the table and long before you get there. The homes here are worth the care... the cottage in Nashville, the acreage in Bean Blossom, the retreat tucked into the hills. Getting you to that closing safely is the whole point.
So when a wire email lands, pause. Pick up the phone. Call the number you already trust. That thirty second call is the cheapest insurance you'll ever buy on the biggest wire you'll ever send.