Real Estate in Uncertain Economic Times: Fraud Prevention Checklist

As a result of the pandemic, real estate executives had to deal with many issues at once: the safety of their employees, managing the business remotely, the ability of their tenants to pay rent, cost reductions, and possibly lender negotiations. But there is another equally important concern that is often not on management’s radar: fraud.

According to the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners’ (ACFE) Occupational Fraud 2022: Report to the Nations, real estate has the highest median fraud loss of any industry. Most real estate is held by private companies that have not invested in the internal controls necessary to prevent, or even recognize, fraud. However, the pandemic and uncertain economic conditions made real estate companies particularly vulnerable to fraud, which heightens financial and reputational risk.