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Kooky
Builder of Shaka, the payment router that pays every agent their commission on closing date.
About Kooky and Shaka →Title fraud is the fear that someone could sell or mortgage a home without the owner knowing, by pretending to be the owner. It is rare, and when it happens the consequences are serious enough that Queensland's land law has been built around preventing it and, where prevention fails, paying for it.
This guide explains how ownership is recorded in Queensland, what "title fraud" means in practice, the identity checks that stand between an impostor and the register, and how the State's guarantee and its compensation scheme work when something goes wrong. It draws on the Land Title Act 1994, on Titles Queensland's published material on compensation, and on commentary in the Queensland Law Society's journal, Proctor. It is a general explanation, not advice on a claim.
Sources: Land Title Act 1994 (Qld); Titles Queensland, "Compensation under the Land Title Act 1994"; Bright Law on mortgagee duties.
How ownership is recorded in Queensland
Queensland land is held under the Torrens system. Ownership does not depend on a chain of old deeds. It depends on a single public record, the freehold land register, kept by the Registrar of Titles and operated day to day by Titles Queensland.
Each lot has a title in the register showing the registered owner and the interests recorded against the land, such as a mortgage, an easement or a caveat. A person becomes the owner when a transfer is registered, and a bank's mortgage takes effect as a registered interest in the same way. The register is the title. Anyone can obtain a current title search for a fee, which Titles Queensland set at $25.71 from 1 July 2026.
Paper certificates of title, the "deeds" many owners once kept in a drawer or at the bank, no longer have legal effect in Queensland. They were phased out on 1 October 2019. An owner who still holds one has a keepsake. Possession of it proves nothing, and its loss or theft does not put the property at risk.
Related readFour in ten home buyers now feel able to spot a settlement scamWhat indefeasibility means
The central rule is in section 184 of the Land Title Act 1994. A registered owner holds their interest subject to the interests recorded on the register and free from all others. Lawyers call this indefeasibility. Proctor, in an article of October 2025, describes its purpose: the register is meant to be conclusive, so that a buyer does not have to investigate the history behind it.
Indefeasibility is what makes buying land workable. A purchaser who deals with the registered owner, pays the price and is registered gets good title, even if something was wrong in an earlier transaction they knew nothing about.
There are exceptions, set out in section 185. The most important is fraud by the registered owner themselves. A person who becomes registered through their own fraud gets no protection. The innocent buyer who deals honestly is protected, and the person who forged their way onto the register is not.
That combination produces the hard case of title fraud. If an impostor forges a transfer and an innocent buyer is registered, the system may leave the innocent buyer on the title. The original owner, who did nothing wrong, has lost the land. The answer the system gives to that owner is money, from the State.
What title fraud looks like
Title fraud takes two main forms.
In the first, someone impersonates the owner in order to sell. They pose as the owner to an agent and a solicitor, sign a contract and a transfer in the owner's name, and direct the proceeds to their own account. The properties most exposed are those where the owner is not present to notice: vacant land, a holiday house, a rental managed from a distance, a home whose owner is overseas or in care, or a property with no mortgage, since a lender's involvement adds another party who must be satisfied.
Related readLand banking and option deeds: testing a Queensland land offerIn the second, someone impersonates the owner in order to borrow. They apply for a loan in the owner's name, secured by a mortgage over the owner's land, and take the loan funds. The owner learns of it when the lender writes about missed repayments.
Both depend on the same thing: convincing a professional that the person in front of them is the registered owner. They are forms of identity fraud, and the defences against them are identity checks. There is also a quieter version in which the signature is genuine but was obtained by deceit, for example from an elderly owner by someone they trust. The register cannot detect that. The witnessing requirement and the courts deal with it.
The checks before a dealing is registered
No single body verifies identity in a Queensland sale. Several do, at different points, each under its own rules.
| Who | When | Source of the duty |
|---|---|---|
| Real estate agent | On appointment to sell, since 1 July 2026 | Federal anti-money-laundering law |
| Solicitor or conveyancer | On taking instructions, before signing documents for the client | Electronic conveyancing rules and professional rules |
| Lender | Before a mortgage is lodged for registration | Land Title Act 1994, section 11A |
| Witness | When a paper instrument is signed | Land Title Act 1994, witnessing provisions |
A general summary. Each duty has its own detailed standard.
Most Queensland transfers are now lodged electronically. In that system the owner does not sign the transfer personally. Their solicitor or conveyancer signs digitally on their behalf, under a client authorisation, and takes responsibility for having verified the client's identity and their right to deal with the land. The national standard for that verification involves a face-to-face meeting, original identity documents and a comparison of the person with their photograph.
Where a paper instrument is still used, the Land Title Act requires the signature to be witnessed by a qualified witness, such as a justice of the peace or a lawyer, who must take reasonable steps to be satisfied of the signer's identity and entitlement.
Related readMoney sent to the wrong account: the first hours and who to tellSince 1 July 2026 there is an earlier check as well. Under the federal anti-money-laundering regime, an agency appointed to sell must identify the seller as its customer. That law is aimed at a different mischief, the laundering of criminal money, but it means a person claiming to own a property now has to prove who they are at the very first step, before a solicitor is involved.
What a lender must do
Lenders have a specific duty in Queensland, and a strong reason to observe it. Section 11A of the Land Title Act requires a mortgagee, before a mortgage is lodged, to take reasonable steps to make sure that the person who signs as mortgagor is the same person who is, or is about to become, the registered owner.
The provision dates from amendments made in 2005. The law firm Bright Law, summarising them, explains that the mortgagee must keep a written record of the steps it took and copies of the documents it relied on for seven years, and that the aim of the change was to reduce the State's compensation bill by making lenders check before registration.
The consequence of not checking is unusual. Under section 185 of the Act, if the mortgage turns out to have been signed by an impostor and the lender did not take the required steps, the lender loses the benefit of indefeasibility for that mortgage. The forged mortgage does not bind the true owner's land. The lender also cannot look to the State for compensation for a loss its own omission allowed.
Related readPayment redirection scams in property sales: the checks that stop themA lender that skips the identity check cannot rely on a forged mortgage
In Queensland a registered mortgage normally binds the land even if something was wrong with it. The exception is a mortgage signed by an impostor where the lender failed to take reasonable steps to verify identity. That mortgage loses the protection of registration.
For an owner this is one of the most protective rules in the system. It places the risk of a forged mortgage on the party best able to prevent it.
What the State guarantee covers
The guarantee has two parts. The first is the security of the register itself: the registered owner's title is good against the world, subject to the stated exceptions. The second is compensation for those who lose because of the way the register operates.
Titles Queensland's published summary states the compensation rule. A person may be entitled to compensation from the State if they are deprived of land, or of an interest in land, because of the fraud of another person or because of an error in the freehold land register, or if they suffer loss or damage because of an incorrect registration. The entitlement is in sections 188 and 188A of the Act.
So the owner whose land was transferred by forgery to an innocent buyer has a claim against the State for the value lost. So does a buyer who paid for land and was registered, only to have a court restore the original owner. The scheme is designed so that an innocent person on either side of a fraud is not left to pursue a criminal who has disappeared.
The compensation is paid by the State. The Act then allows the State to recover what it has paid from the person whose fraud caused the loss.
What the guarantee does not cover
The guarantee is a guarantee of title. It answers the question "who owns this land and what is registered against it". It does not answer every question a buyer might have about a property, and it does not compensate for every kind of loss.
Related readProperty spruikers in Queensland: seminars, commissions and the rulesTitles Queensland lists circumstances in which no compensation is payable. They include cases where the Registrar can simply correct the error in the register, claims for personal injury, and the situations set out in sections 188A, 188AA and 189 of the Act. Those sections deal, among other things, with losses a person contributed to themselves and with the position of a lender that did not verify identity.
Proctor's article lists matters that fall outside both indefeasibility and the compensation provisions altogether. They are defects in the property and not in the title: a boundary encroachment that was never surveyed, building work that does not match its approval or has none, and obligations under planning and building laws that attach to the land whether or not they appear on the register. A buyer who discovers after settlement that a deck was built without approval has no claim on the State. That risk is managed by searches and inspections before the contract becomes unconditional.
The scheme also does not cover the redirection of a payment. If a buyer's deposit is sent to a false bank account, no interest in land has been lost and the register has not been affected. That is a different kind of fraud with different remedies.
How a compensation claim is made
Titles Queensland sets out the process. The person completes a Claim for Compensation form and sends it to the Legal Services unit of Titles Queensland. The office acknowledges the claim and assesses it.
- ApplicationA claim form is lodged with Titles Queensland, within 12 years of when the person knew or should have known of the loss.
- AssessmentTitles Queensland examines whether the loss falls within sections 188 or 188A and whether an exclusion applies.
- Decision or courtIf liability is denied, the claimant may apply to the Supreme Court under section 188B.
The time limit is generous but real. An application must be made within 12 years after the person became aware, or ought reasonably to have become aware, of the circumstances giving rise to the claim.
Related readRental scams in Queensland: the warning signs before you pay a bondTitles Queensland states that its staff cannot give legal advice on an individual claim and recommends that a claimant see a solicitor. Claims often turn on questions of fact: whether the loss was caused by fraud or by something else, what the land was worth at the relevant date, and whether the claimant's own conduct contributed. In a fraud case there is usually a police investigation running alongside, and the claim on the State does not depend on anyone being convicted.
What an owner can do to lower the risk
The system's protections work without the owner doing anything. A few habits make an attempt less likely to succeed and more likely to be noticed early.
Keep identity documents and personal details secure. An impersonation begins with someone else holding enough of the owner's information to pass a check. Rates notices, old contracts, loan statements and copies of a licence or passport are the raw material.
Keep the address for notices current. Council rates notices, land tax assessments and body corporate levies go to the address held by each authority. An owner who has moved, especially one who owns vacant land or a rental, and whose mail goes to an old address has removed the simplest warning they would otherwise receive.
Look at the title now and then. A current title search shows the registered owner and every registered dealing. An owner of an unmortgaged property that is not their home can see at a glance whether anything unexpected has been lodged.
Be known to the people around the property. A property manager, a neighbour or a body corporate manager who knows how to reach the real owner is a practical safeguard. A selling agent who receives an approach to list a property will usually make enquiries of exactly these people.
Tell the managing agent what would be unusual. An owner of a rental who lives elsewhere can make clear to the property manager that any instruction to sell, to change where rent is paid or to hand over keys will come by phone from the owner personally. The manager then has a simple test for any message that arrives claiming to speak for the owner.
Take a call from an agent or solicitor seriously. An owner who is rung about a sale or a loan they know nothing about should treat it as a warning, tell the caller so plainly, and report it to Queensland Police and to Titles Queensland.
Where the risk really lies
It helps to keep title fraud in proportion. An impostor has to pass an agent's identity check, a solicitor's verification, in many cases a lender's, and the scrutiny of a buyer's solicitor reading the documents from the other side. Each of those professionals is exposed to loss, and in some cases to the loss of their own protection under the Act, if the check is not done.
The register tells the world who owns a property. The identity checks decide who is allowed to speak for that owner, and the State stands behind both when they fail.
The much more common frauds around property do not touch the register at all. They divert a payment, or collect a bond for a rental that does not exist. Against those, the State guarantee offers nothing, and the protection is the check each person makes before sending money. For the title itself, Queensland owners have a system that makes fraud difficult, places much of the risk on the professionals and lenders who are best placed to stop it, and compensates the innocent when it happens anyway.
Kooky, from Shaka
Kooky edits Queensland Estate and builds Shaka, the payment router he made for Queensland property professionals. One payment comes in, and every agent, agency and party in the deal receives their signed share on closing date.
