The lawyer warned about the activation of the "grandmother's scheme" when selling cars

The number of cases of using the "grandmother's scheme" when selling cars in Russia may increase by 50-70% in 2026 compared to 2025. This was announced on December 1 by Anton Palyulin, a lecturer at the Department of Legal Sciences at Synergy University.

A "grandmother's scheme" refers to property transactions in which an elderly person acts as the seller. Subsequently, the seller claims that he allegedly acted under the influence of a fraudster and demands to return the property without returning the funds deposited by the buyer.

According to Palyutin, at the moment there is no accurate data on the statistics of crimes related to the scheme of deceiving pensioners, since such statistics are not kept. However, if the trend towards an increase in real estate scams continues, then scammers are likely to switch to car scams.

"Based on the growth of real estate fraud, we can expect an increase in car fraud by 50-70%. One should not assume that a foreign car owned by a gullible pensioner is rather an exception," Palyulin said in an interview "Газета.Ru ".

Palyulin recommended car buyers to be attentive at the negotiation stage. He advises paying attention to the seller's behavior, especially if he cannot remember the last time he drove a car or confuses the details of the technical inspection.

Also, according to the expert, it is necessary to conduct a standard check through the traffic police to find out information about bail, theft or other restrictions on the vehicle. An important step is also to check the seller through the Notary Chamber's website and request a certificate from a neuropsychiatric dispensary if the seller is a pensioner. Palyulin also recommended recording all negotiations on video in order to capture the moment when the seller confirms that he is not acting under pressure.

They were scrapped: who will have to pay extra for customs clearance of purchased cars

Increased recycling will lead to millions of dollars in costs for car owners

On November 29, Oleg Silkin, a real estate lawyer, reported that in order to avoid losses when buying real estate with the risks of fraud under the "granny apartments" scheme, lawyers offer two ways of insurance, the principles of which are also described in the novel "12 Chairs". The lawyer called the mechanism under which the apartment is returned only after the money is refunded fair. According to him, when canceling a deal, the parties must return everything that was received under the deal — this is called bilateral restitution.

All important news is on the Izvestia channel in the MAX messenger.