Vancouver advisor barred after secretly mortgaging client’s home
The panel said the case stood out for “the sheer breadth and duration of his deliberate dishonesty.”
How a client’s absence opened the door to mortgage fraud
The client, a Cantonese speaker with limited English, became a PI client in 2017. Liu became his main contact in late 2019, gaining access to copies of his driver’s licence and passport.
When the client left for a six-week trip to China in January 2020, he gave Liu a key to his home to collect his mail. Pandemic travel restrictions kept him away until June 2022, and his account statements were never sent on.
In January 2021, Liu opened a Scotiabank chequing account in the client’s name and filed a forged transfer authorization at PI. Seventeen transfers left a net $52,695.38 missing. By July 2022, the accounts held $43.31.
In March 2022, he used the client’s identification to secure a $268,400 mortgage on the home from a mortgage investment corporation – a non-bank lender that pools investor capital – with documents signed remotely.
