With the help of the Pacific Legal Foundation, a title company in Texas filed a lawsuit in mid-April against the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), seeking to block a new rule requiring intrusive data collection and reporting for cash real estate purchases.
“Congress cannot shirk its lawmaking responsibilities by granting federal agencies a blank check to write laws…FinCEN is now mandating unreasonable collection and reporting of personal information to the federal government; the agency claims a sweeping power to require reporting on conceivably any consumer transaction simply because systematic reporting might prove useful to the government.” Said Luke Wake, an attorney at Pacific Legal Foundation.
In 1993, Celia Flowers bought the first of many title companies that she now owns. She and her daughter, Erica Hallmark,own and manage the East Texas Title Companies, based in Tyler, Texas. The company facilitates or gathers information for thousands of real estate closings each year and is licensed in more than 80 counties across Texas, where there’s been a surge in “cash purchases,” any transaction in which the buyer does not require a bank loan.
According to the PLF release, in 2024, FinCEN, operating under the supervision of the U.S. Secretary of Treasury, finalized a rule that will force title companies to collect and report detailed information about non-financed real estate transactions, including personal information from everyone involved in the sale, and information about how the payments were made. They say breaking the rules (even accidentally) could lead to large fines and even criminal charges. The rule is set to go into effect in December, 2025.
Click here to read the full release at the Pacific Legal Foundation.
Click here to download a copy of the complaint.
