This is how the Summit Title & Escrow scam in Puerto Vallarta, Jalisco recently took shape. This bad news are not reported outside the local real estate community. It is “business as usual” for real estate in Puerto Vallarta. The main reason that this scam did not cause a huge scandal is because the total amount scammed is relatively small from what we know first hand (maybe 25 Million Pesos).
Sadly there is no consolation for the victims, no path to ever see their money refunded and no immediate assistance from local government. We owe this article to those victims. Matthew Davidson (Dixon) or who ever he is will not get away with this for long.
This is how it happened:
A male by the name of Matthew Davidson or Dixon is the master criminal everyone is looking for in Puerto Vallarta. He created a false company that operated in Puerto Vallarta for a few years without any issues until the time was right for him to take the money and run away into hiding. There was an actual physical office operating in Fluvial, Puerto Vallarta that is empty now. There was a website online called summitmex.com with all the right information to make all seem legit that in now in maintenance mode.
How did this person do this? He is a professional scam artist. He took his time to set up his victims. Those victims include the employs he left behind to answer questions nobody knows the answers to. Questions like, “where is the money?”. He sent his sales people door to door to all local real estate offices offering their services. This fake Summit Title & Escrow offered a commission for every account opened with them. It is not something new. Almost all escrow companies offer a commission for an account open. In most cases, even real estate agents do not know about such commissions and that amount is not collected. So, this was not a red flag.
This Matthew Davidson or Dixon set up a different company by the name of Costero Holding Group S de RL de CV and opened bank accounts under this company. The basic reasoning was to able to receive funds in pesos and what nobody noticed was that the account was under the control of this scam artist. When the time was right or when this person had a set amount in his account he drained the funds and vanished. Real Estate transactions were left without the buyers funds anywhere in sight. Attempts to contact the escrow company failed. Local people working at the office were told to not go to work due to technical problems. And that was it. Nobody saw it coming. Real Estate companies from big to small were affected by this scam.
If we all go back and look at red flags we can agree that they were many but, we can also agree that the red flags were covered in smoke enough to cloud our vision. In retrospect, now the entire community is aware of the scam. Brokers are taking a closer look at the practices in place when using an escrow company and agents are being trained to prevent this from happening again.
Feel free to comment if you have more insight on this on going issue. We do not want to push this under the rug or forget about this. We care and want to be as responsible and accountable with everyone involved.
Please note that the name Summit Title & Escrow was used in Puerto Vallarta, Jalisco, Mexico and to our knowledge has no association with a legit company that might be in operation elsewhere.
It is important to filter the information shared. There is a path to report this to the local government. Each case is different. Please seek legal counsel.
5 thoughts on “Summit Title & Escrow scam”
I am one of the scammed seller. The escrow was required by the buyers. I didn’t sell with a realtor but used the services of Riedesser y Associados.
Yes. a few closing coordinators were affected by this. Keep in mind, they are mostly attorneys who know what to look for.
I was also scammed by them for 13 million I don’t understand the part that if we didn’t receive the funds how could the transaction be valid ????
Surely it can be established with bank statements that you did not receive the funds. The scam is widely understood. Keep pressure on the people who helped you to see things be put to right.
we followed the instructions of our lawyer she is the one who gave us this scammer
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