Real Estate Wire Fraud and Voice-Clone Calls: A Call-Back Script

Write a one-page rule that nobody sends, changes or acts on wire instructions by email or on an incoming call alone: every instruction is confirmed by calling a phone number already held on file or taken from the title company's own public listing, using a written script, before any money moves.

The rule has to survive a good voice. A cloned voice on the phone, a perfect copy of an agent's email signature and a plausible urgent reason can all be faked, but a number you already held cannot be swapped by a criminal in someone else's inbox. That is why NAR's published guidance centres on confirming wiring instructions by phone with a known number and never emailing financial information. This checklist turns that into the office paperwork, with AI used for drafting the documents and role-play scenarios, not for judging who is real.

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What the procedure has to defeat

Describe the threat in the policy so staff know why the steps feel fussy. In a typical case, a criminal reads email in a compromised account, learns a closing date and the names of the parties, then sends "updated" wire instructions that look like they come from the title company or the agent. NAR describes this as business email compromise and email account compromise. A phone call may follow to add pressure ("the wire has to go today or the closing slips"). Voice cloning adds a new risk: the caller may sound exactly like someone the client trusts.

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Three weaknesses make the scam work. Instructions arrive through an unverified channel. The person acting has no independent way to check. And the deadline makes a pause feel like a failure. The office procedure below removes the first by moving verification to a different channel, supplies the second with a number on file and a pre-agreed phrase, and removes the third by making the pause a rule.

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The call-back rule in plain words

Put this at the top of the policy, in words that fit on a slide.

1. We never send wire instructions by email, text or chat. Only the title or closing company sends instructions, through its secure portal or the method agreed on day one.
2. If anyone says instructions have changed, we stop. We do not forward, repeat, act on or reply to the change.
3. We call the title or closing company on a number we already held before the change, or on the number on its own public website. We never use a number in the message that announced the change.
4. We ask the questions on the script and write the answers on the file note.
5. If a client is about to wire, we remind them to call the title company on that known number, read the instructions back and confirm them before sending.
6. Nobody can be overruled on this by seniority, a deadline or a client's irritation. The delay is the policy.

An AI assistant can help you turn these into your office's language, but the content must come from you and your broker. Prompt it with: "Rewrite these six rules for a brokerage staff handbook in plain words a 12-year-old could follow. Do not add or remove any rule. Keep each under 30 words." Then read the output line by line against the original. Assistants like to add soft qualifiers ("where possible") that undo the rule.

Which number counts as a "known number"

This is where offices slip. A known number is a number you can trace to somewhere that a criminal could not have edited. Rank them.

On day one of every file, record the verified numbers for the title company, the lender and the client in a field of the transaction file called "verified contact numbers", and date it. When something changes later, that field is the first place staff look. Your compliance check can include it; AI compliance file review for brokers shows how a file review can confirm the field is filled in.

The staff script for an incoming change

Staff freeze when a client or "title company" is pressuring them. A script gives them words. Keep it short enough to be read aloud, and rehearse it until it feels natural.

When someone phones or emails saying instructions have changed

"Thank you for letting me know. Our office policy is that we do not act on any change to wire instructions until we have confirmed it by phone with the title company on a number we already hold. I will call them now. I will not send any details on until that is done, and I will come back to you within the hour. Please do not send any money until you have heard from me or from the title company on its own number."

Notice what is in it: no accusation, no argument, a time limit that sounds helpful and a clear instruction to the client. Never say "this looks fake", because a real change request is possible and you should not insult a genuine title company. You simply do not act on any change without the call.

When you make the call-back

"I am calling from [office name] about the file for [property reference]. I received a message saying the wiring instructions have changed. Can you confirm whether you have sent new instructions? Can you tell me the last four digits of the account number you have on file, and the name of the account holder? And please confirm the closing date and the amount you are expecting."

Write the reply on the file note with the date, time, the name of the person you spoke to and the number you called. If the real title company says it sent nothing, stop. Tell your broker, tell the title company the message you received and preserve the email without clicking anything in it.

When you speak to a client who is about to wire

"Before you send anything, please call the title company yourself on the number in your closing paperwork, not one from an email or text. Read the account number back to them, and ask them to confirm it and the account name. If they cannot, do not send. Once the wire has gone, call them again to confirm it arrived."

A written wire-instruction policy, filled in

Ask an assistant for a first draft, and give it your facts. Here is a prompt that keeps the output tight.

Draft a one-page "wire instruction and payment verification policy" for a real estate brokerage office. It must contain: purpose; who may send wire instructions (only the title or closing company through its secure portal); a ban on sending or relaying instructions by email, text or chat; the call-back rule (call a number held on file before the change, never one in the message); a required file note for every verification (date, time, person, number called, result); what to do if instructions change after day one; what to do if a client says they have already sent a wire; who to notify internally; and a review date. Plain language, numbered sections, no legal conclusions. Mark anything I must fill in with [BRACKETS].

A lawyer or your broker must review the result before it becomes policy, because requirements for brokerages differ. Mark the version and the date. Re-issue it every year or after any incident.

The client notice and the email signature line

NAR's guidance suggests educating buyers about the scams and putting a wire-fraud notice in your email signature, and it notes that many brokers now require clients to sign a disclosure acknowledging the risk. Have the assistant draft the signature line and the acknowledgement, in plain words:

"WIRE FRAUD WARNING: Our office will never send you wire instructions by email, text or chat. If you receive a message that appears to change where you should send money, do not act on it. Call the title company on the number in your closing paperwork, and call us."

Put this at the foot of every agent's email signature and in the first welcome message of each transaction. The longer notice for the acknowledgement should say who will and will not contact them, how to verify, and what to do if something goes wrong. Ask your broker whether the acknowledgement should be signed on paper or by e-signature, and file it in the transaction folder.

Role-play scenarios you can use at a team meeting

Staff remember procedures they practise. Ask an assistant to write five short scenarios, then run them in a 20-minute meeting. Examples to seed the prompt, each with the right answer:

• The urgent email. A message in the title company's name says the lender changed and the funds are due by 3pm. Right answer: stop, call-back on file, no action on the email.
• The cloned voice. A buyer phones, sounding exactly like himself, to say he is travelling and wants the wire details texted to a new number. Right answer: do not send details at all; call him on his number on file, confirm identity with a pre-agreed phrase, and refer him to the title company.
• The "agent" in a hurry. A message from a colleague's account, asking the office manager to approve a payment of the client's deposit to a different account. Right answer: call the colleague on a number known to the office, and refuse to pay deposits except through the title process.
• The pushy client. A client is angry about the delay and says the call-back is unnecessary. Right answer: stay polite, repeat the rule, offer to make the call with the client on the line.
• The late discovery. A client emails to say she sent a wire yesterday, and now the title company says it never arrived. Right answer: tell her to call her bank for a recall at once, and bring in the broker and the title company the same hour.

Rotate who plays the pressure. The point is to practise saying "I will call you back" in the face of annoyance. Staff who find it awkward in a meeting find it much harder with a real client.

A pre-agreed phrase for voice checks

If a voice can be cloned, a familiar voice is not proof. Add a second factor that cannot be scraped from a video or social post: a word or phrase agreed in person or on a verified call early in the file. It should not be a birthday, a pet's name or anything in public view. For example, a short phrase the client chooses, written only in the file and not in any email. If a caller cannot give the phrase, you do not discuss the file, whatever the voice sounds like. For internal staff, agree a phrase for payment approvals and rotate it every few months.

This low-tech step matters because AI detection of cloned voices is unreliable, and an office's response should not depend on a tool being right. Give staff permission to say "I cannot verify you; I will call you back on the number on file." For the opposite side of voice technology, where an office uses a voice assistant of its own, see cloning your own voice and consent.

If it goes wrong: the first hour

NAR's advice for a victim is blunt: time is of the essence. Have an incident card ready, because nobody thinks clearly in the middle of a loss.

1. The client calls their bank at once and asks for a recall of the wire.
2. The office informs the broker and the title company, and stops any related payments.
3. Report the incident to your national cybercrime reporting centre; NAR's guidance says reporting within 24 hours, and no later than 72, gives the best chance of recovery.
4. Preserve the evidence: the original emails, the headers if you know how to get them, call logs and the file note.
5. Change passwords and enable multi-factor authentication on any account that may have been compromised, starting with email.
6. Tell your insurer if you hold a cyber or errors-and-omissions policy, and ask your broker about notification duties.

A realistic mistake: an office has a policy, but the verified numbers field is empty on half the files. Under pressure, a staff member searches the web for the title company, calls the first number on a sponsored result and reads out the account numbers to someone who is not the company. A rule that says "call a known number" is worthless if the known number is not recorded. That is why the day-one field is on the checklist.

A worked example: a $48,000 closing payment

An illustration with made-up figures. A buyer is due to wire $48,000 for the balance of the purchase on Friday. On Wednesday afternoon the buyer's agent receives an email that appears to be from the closing company, saying its bank has changed and the funds must go to a new account by Thursday at noon. The signature looks right and the phone number in it is new.

Following the procedure: the agent does not reply, and does not forward the message to the buyer. She opens the transaction file, finds the "verified contact numbers" field filled in on day one, and calls the closing company's number from there. A receptionist transfers her to the closing officer, who says no change has been made and nothing was sent. The agent writes the file note: Wednesday, 3:40pm, spoke to the closing officer, number from the field, no change, message treated as fraudulent. She tells her broker, forwards the message to the closing company without clicking links, and phones the buyer on his number from the file to say that if he gets anything like it, he should ignore it and call. The whole check takes about fifteen minutes.

Compare that with the version without a procedure. The agent forwards the email to the buyer "to be helpful", the buyer replies to the sender for confirmation and receives a convincing answer, and $48,000 leaves the buyer's bank on Thursday morning. The agent's work was not careless in intent; the missing piece was a rule that says the message is not to be acted on at all. A quarter of an hour on Wednesday is what the policy buys.

Test that it works: a quiet drill

Policies fail in practice, not on paper. Once a quarter, test the office with a harmless fake. Ask a colleague outside the transaction to send a message from a spare address, with a made-up change of instructions and a mild deadline, to an agent who is not expecting it. Observe, without warning anyone, whether the agent stops, finds the verified number, makes the call and writes the file note. Score the drill on four points: did they avoid replying, did they use a known number, did they write the file note, did they tell the broker? Then run a ten-minute debrief that praises the right moves and fixes the gaps. Do not name and shame; the aim is to make the rule automatic.

Keep a one-line log: date, scenario, result, fix. After a year you have evidence that the procedure is practised, which matters when your insurer or broker asks what you do about this risk. If more than one drill in four ends with someone acting on the message, the script is not being used; shorten it, put it where staff can see it and rehearse it again before running another drill.

Checklist to adopt this week

• Written wire-instruction and payment verification policy, reviewed by your broker or lawyer, dated.
• Six-line call-back rule on the wall and in the staff handbook.
• "Verified contact numbers" field in every transaction file, filled on day one.
• Staff script for incoming changes, call-backs and clients about to wire, rehearsed.
• Client notice in every email signature, plus a signed acknowledgement per transaction if your broker requires it.
• Pre-agreed phrase for voice verification, kept out of email and public sources.
• Incident card with the first-hour steps and the numbers to call.
• Quarterly 20-minute drill using the five scenarios.
• No AI tool relied on to judge whether a voice or email is real.
• Staff reminded not to paste client financial details into free AI tools; stopping staff pasting client data into free tools covers how to put that in the handbook.

The same call-back idea applies to other payments leaving the office, such as a supplier's changed bank details. The conveyancing call-back procedure is a close parallel, and escrow inbox triage and closing checklists shows how the closing side keeps its own instructions safe. This page is practical guidance, not legal advice; your broker and lawyer decide what your office must do.

Wire-fraud procedure questions

Why is a call-back safer than replying to the email?

A criminal who has taken over an email account controls both the message and any reply. A call to a number you already held, from your file or the company's public site, reaches the real party. It sits outside the compromised channel, which is why NAR guidance stresses a known number.

Can AI detect a cloned voice on a call?

Do not rely on it. Detection tools are unreliable and the point of the procedure is that it works without them. Treat a familiar voice as proof of nothing, and verify by a call to a number you already had, plus a pre-agreed check.

Who should be allowed to send wire instructions?

Only the title or closing company, through its secure portal or by a method agreed at the start of the file. Agents and brokerage staff should not send or relay instructions by plain email. Write that into the policy and the client notice so everybody hears it early.

What should I do if a client has already sent a wire?

Move at once. Tell the client to call their bank to request a recall, then report the incident to the national cybercrime reporting centre and your broker. NAR guidance says time is of the essence, and that reporting within 24 hours gives the best chance of recovery.

Further reads

• ChatGPT for Realtors: Brokerage Rules for Emails, Disclosures, Follow-Ups — Brokerage rules for what AI may touch in client emails.
• AI Email Triage for Shared Inboxes: Sales, Support, and Invoices — Spot urgent payment emails before they reach the wrong person.
• How to Catch Duplicate Invoices and Payment Fraud With AI — Payment checks for the office's own supplier invoices.
• AI Tools for Real Estate Brokers: From Transactions to Agent Support — Where AI fits in transaction support, and where it should not.
• AI Email Management for Virtual Assistants: Rules, Drafts, Handover — Inbox rules and drafts for an assistant who handles agent email.
• AI Answering Service for Title Companies: Cost and Status-Call Rules — Closing-status calls, wire requests and identity checks: what an AI answering service may handle for a title company, and what it costs a month.
• AI Automations for Real Estate Wholesalers: Sourcing to Contracts — A step-by-step map of what to automate in a wholesaling business, where a person must stay in the loop, and the consent and disclosure rules.
• AI Sales Role-Play for Solo Real Estate Agents: Free Tools Compared — Which free AI tools can play a seller or buyer, what each free tier allows, and an objection bank and weekly routine to practise with.
• AI Policy for a Real Estate Brokerage: What Agents May and May Not Do — Turn a broker AI policy into rules an agent can follow on a Tuesday: do and don't lists, sample clauses and a sign-off sheet.
• ALTA Best Practices and AI: What a Small Title Agency Should Document — Write the AI-use log for a small title agency: what Best Practices 5.0 says about AI, vendors and the written security plan, with a filled-in log.
• AI for Title Companies: Six Jobs Where It Helps and Where It Fails — Six title and escrow workflows with the precise point where AI assistance ends and a trained reviewer takes over.
• Can AI Prepare a CMA? What Realtors Must Still Verify — How to prepare a CMA with your MLS tool first and an AI assistant for narrative and error checks, and how to verify every comp and adjustment.
• AI Tools and AI Development: The Complete 2026 Guide — the AI hub, including every tutorial in the AI-for-business series.

Sources: NAR wire-fraud guidance page (confirm wiring instructions by phone using a known or independently obtained number; never email financial information; wire-fraud notice in email signatures; signed risk disclosures; bank recall and a report within 24 to 72 hours).