Real Estate Scams

All you agents out there beware and be watchful. I received a lead from Realtor.com from a gentleman from Japan wanting to buy a home within a month's time frame and he would be paying cash, so no time issues. Sounds good and believable at this point. Poor guy, who wouldn't want to leave Japan right now, right? I set up a search and he picks out a house and says, "This is my new home. Send me all the documents in Docusign so I can sign them because I'm in a remote area of Japan." I sent him all the required forms on DotLoop and he sent them back signed. It was a new home he chose and I told him they would require proof of funds so he sends me proof of funds and a copy of his passport. He says everything will be taken care of through his attorney in Canada, which is where his funds are. Then he requests my attorney's name and contact information so his attorney can send the certified funds to him. After explaining the process and how the title company is used, not attorneys for real estate transactions here, he insists on my attorney's name and info. After talking to the title company,I send him their attorney's name. You know, the whole time going through this I'm thinking is this a real buyer or not? Nothing screamed scam, but how else can we figure it out other than working the process until we have some reason to think it's a hoax. After the conversation with the title company, I decided to investigate a little and searched overseas real estate scams. Tons came up, of course. At that point I decided that was what this was. At some point he would send a phony check, probably for more than the required amount and ask for those amounts in excess to be given back and then the check would bounce. I Googled his name and immediately got a story about a guy by that name doing the same thing through the Trulia website. I'm still doing a little research. Curious why he was insisting on an attorney versus the title company. Was he just distracting me with something to take my focus off of the transaction? Is there a harder penalty for fraud against a title company than an attorney? In any event, I'd like everyone to be careful and learn from my time-wasting supposed home sale. By the way, the name he was using is Hirao Noriaki. He used the same name in the Trulia incident.