Deed Fraud in North Carolina: How Guilford and Forsyth County Homeowners Can Get a Free Property Fraud Alert

A fellow real estate agent out of Flagstaff Arizona, where I lived for ten years, emailed her whole client list last week about a new state program called ERAS, the Early Real Estate Sales Alert System. Register your property once, and if anyone ever tries to sell or borrow against it, the state texts or emails you before the sale reaches the closing table. It got me wondering about what we actually have here in North Carolina, and specifically in Guilford and Forsyth counties, where most of my clients own their homes.

The short answer: we do not have a statewide, before-it-closes system like Arizona's yet. What we do have is a free, county-run alert you can sign up for today, plus a bill sitting in the North Carolina Senate that could change things further. Here is what actually exists, what it does and does not cover, and who should sign up first.

What Deed Fraud Actually Looks Like

Deed fraud is someone forging your signature on a deed, filing it with the register of deeds, and moving your property into a name that is not yours. Once that filing is on record, the fraudster can try to sell the property, take out a loan against it, or both. Because most owners are not checking the register of deeds every week, months can pass before anyone notices.

North Carolina has already seen this play out. In Raleigh, a stranger named Dawn Mangum filed paperwork claiming that Craig Adams's four million dollar home was in foreclosure, then attempted to move the deed into her own name. She was charged with forgery and attempting to obtain property under false pretenses, and a civil court later ruled the deed fraudulent. In Zebulon, a homeowner named Tarsha Blalock discovered her three acre property had been listed for sale on Zillow and Redfin for over forty four thousand dollars, without her knowledge or consent. She caught it and proved ownership before the sale could go through.

Nationally, the FBI has told reporters that property theft scam reports have jumped sharply over the past several years. The details vary case to case, but the pattern does not: someone finds a piece of property that nobody is watching closely, forges a document, and moves fast.

Who Scammers Target

The Guilford County Register of Deeds has flagged the properties that draw the most attention from fraudsters: homes owned by elderly residents, and properties that sit vacant or are managed from a distance. That second category covers a lot of ground in the Piedmont Triad, where rental homes, vacation properties, and land held for investment are common. If you own a rental you do not visit often, land you are holding for later, or a home you inherited and have not moved into yet, you are exactly the kind of owner this is aimed at protecting.

North Carolina's County by County Alert System

Unlike Arizona's ERAS, which flags a sale while it is still in escrow, North Carolina's programs notify you after a document has already been recorded under your name. It is not a lock on the front door. It is a smoke detector. The North Carolina Association of Registers of Deeds keeps a running list of which counties participate, since this is offered county by county rather than through a single statewide portal.

Guilford County (Greensboro, High Point)

Guilford County's Property Fraud Alert is free and takes about five minutes to set up at fraudalert.bislandrecords.com. You register your name and any variations of it, and the system emails or texts you any time a document is recorded under that name in Guilford County. The Register of Deeds is clear that this does not stop a document from being recorded. It only gets you word of it fast, so you can act before further damage is done. Questions go to the Guilford County Register of Deeds at 336-641-7556 or through guilforddeeds.com.

Forsyth County (Winston-Salem, Kernersville)

Forsyth County runs the same free alert system through the same portal. Each notification includes the recording date, the instrument number, and the book and page, so you can pull up the actual document at forsythdeeds.com and see exactly what was filed. If part of your property or your rental portfolio sits on the Forsyth County side of Kernersville, this one is for you.

If you own property outside Guilford or Forsyth, check the NCARD list above before assuming you are not covered. Wake County launched its own alert system in April 2025 after the Craig Adams case, and several other counties, including New Hanover, Dare, Rockingham, Pender, and Beaufort, have their own versions as well.

What's Moving in Raleigh

State lawmakers introduced the Title Fraud Prevention Act, House Bill 535, in 2025. It passed the House in May and has been sitting in the Senate Rules Committee since. As written, it would let registers of deeds require a government issued photo ID before recording a deed, add a source of title requirement, require tax office certification of the listed owner, and create a new legal path for owners to sue to clear a fraudulent deed from their title. It also directs the legislature to study whether North Carolina should build a statewide alert system similar to Arizona's, with findings due back in the 2026 session. A study is not the same as a working system, so for now, the county programs above are what is actually available to sign up for.

This section is general information, not legal advice. Talk to a real estate attorney about your specific situation, especially if you already suspect something is wrong with your title.

Beyond the Alert: Protecting Your Title

The county alert is free and worth five minutes of your time, but it is one layer, not the whole plan. A few others worth putting in place:

• Sign up for the free alert in every county where you own property, using every version of your name that might appear on a deed.
• If you own a rental or land you do not visit often, check the register of deeds website for that county every few months, even without an alert.
• Ask your closing attorney about an owner's title insurance policy when you buy, separate from the lender's policy, which only protects the bank.
• If a notification or a records search turns up something you did not file, call the register of deeds and a real estate attorney the same day. Do not wait to see if it resolves itself.

Title issues come up more often than people expect, and not always because of fraud. My post on mastering due diligence in Greensboro real estate walks through what buyers and owners should be checking in the public record, and my post on deed restrictions versus HOA restrictions in North Carolina covers a different kind of deed question that trips people up. For questions about closing attorneys, home inspectors, and other trusted local professionals, my Preferred Vendors page has a full list, built from people I have actually worked with.

You can read more posts like this one on the Joy Watson Real Estate blog.

Joy Watson Real Estate is an independent, non-corporate brokerage in Greensboro, NC. Joy Watson is a licensed North Carolina real estate broker (Broker-in-Charge). Questions about buying, selling, or renting in the Triad? Reach out through JoyWatsonRealEstate.com.