San Francisco's city attorney is fighting to void eight fraudulent deeds on a Sea Cliff mansion
A brazen attempt to steal a $4.4 million San Francisco mansion through a succession of forged deeds has ended in court.
San Francisco City Attorney David Chiu filed a civil lawsuit this month against Brandon Aadee and Diana Peng, alleging a 13-month scheme to seize and resell the Sea Cliff property.
The home at 250 32nd Avenue was last legitimately sold in 2013, when Wei Wang and Xiangdong Guo purchased it for $2.41 million. Wang later moved abroad, leaving the property vacant and accumulating more than $320,000 in unpaid city taxes.
In July 2025, Aadee recorded a deed purporting to transfer ownership from Wang to himself, which the city alleges was forged.
Over the following 13 months, he and Peng transferred the property back and forth eight times. Several of those deeds claimed the transfers arose from a "dissolution of marriage" or "divorce." The city says there is no record the two were ever married.
"Defendants are effectively trying to steal a house and sell it to make millions in profit," Chiu said.
"Several notaries have said defendants forged their signatures or illegally altered the deeds. That is fraud, and they are trying to profit off that crime."
A chain of forged notary stamps
Court filings allege at least five of the eight deeds contained forged notary signatures, fraudulent stamps, or attestations altered after notarization.
Notaries Steven Korbin and Joe Ventura confirmed their signatures and seals were forged outright.
Virginia-based notaries Lauren Fridley and Crystal Morgan separately declared that documents they legitimately notarized remotely were later altered to falsely indicate Aadee had appeared before them in person.
San Francisco Superior Court Judge Charles F. Haines issued a temporary restraining order barring both defendants from selling, encumbering, or otherwise affecting the home's title while the case proceeds. Neither appeared at the scheduled hearing.
Aadee has an active arrest warrant in San Mateo County. San Francisco Assessor-Recorder Joaquín Torres welcomed the intervention.
"Real estate fraud is a serious matter for law enforcement and the courts," he said. "I'm glad to see the City Attorney is helping move it there."
What mortgage professionals need to know
Another California title fraud enforcement makes clear this is not an isolated incident.
The American Land Title Association's (ALTA) 2026 Critical Issues Study found that 59% of title insurance firms encountered at least one seller impersonation fraud attempt in 2025, more than double the 28% who reported an attempt the prior year, based on survey responses from 245 title professionals.
The FBI's 2025 Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) report put national real estate fraud losses at $275.1 million, up from $173 million in 2024.
As Matt Seguin, senior principal of fraud solutions at Cotality, previously told Mortgage Professional America, the imbalance between frequency and financial exposure is stark: "fraud for profit is only 20% of the time, but it's probably 80% of the losses."
The National Association of Mortgage Brokers has urged professionals to treat fraud awareness as a core client-service responsibility, noting that deed-transfer schemes often surface only when a fraudulent sale is already in motion.
In the Sea Cliff case, the defendants reportedly listed the property at $2.9 million, well below its $4.4 million valuation, in an apparent bid to close quickly before scrutiny arrived.
The city is seeking cancellation of all eight disputed deeds and civil penalties of up to $2,500 per violation. A permanent injunction hearing is scheduled for October 23.
Stay updated with the freshest mortgage news. Get exclusive interviews, breaking news, and industry events in your inbox, and always be the first to know by subscribing to our FREE daily newsletter.
