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A guide published by DottoChecked 8 Oct 2026

A home sale, screen by screen

Sell property online: listing, signing and settling on screen

Much of a home sale now happens on a screen. The listing is a public web page, the contract may carry an electronic signature, the seller’s identity is checked before the transfer, and in several states settlement runs through an electronic network. Each of those screens has its own rules, written state by state, and official sources warn of scams that reach a sale along the way.

This is a guide to the digital sale, published by Dotto. It takes the five screens in the order a seller meets them and names the official page where each rule lives.

Dotto is not a real estate agent and does not provide real estate agency services.

General information about the rules, not legal advice. How a rule applies to a particular contract is a question for the seller’s own solicitor or licensed conveyancer.

Five screens, each with its rule and a warning

Each screen below pairs one rule or piece of official advice with a scam warning from an official source. The address at the top of each one is the government site the rule comes from.

  1. Source: consumer.vic.gov.auScreen 1 of 5 · Listing

    The listing: a price on a public page

    Rule

    In Victoria, a price in a property advertisement is a single figure or a range of up to 10%, with no ‘from’, ‘offers above’, ‘+’ or similar words or symbols added.

    Scam warning

    Consumer Protection WA describes a bogus buyer, said to be based overseas, who approaches a seller about the home they have on the market.

    Price in an online listing, state by state

  2. Source: legislation.vic.gov.auScreen 2 of 5 · Signing

    The signature: ink, or a typed name on a screen

    Rule

    Under Victoria’s Electronic Transactions Act, a transaction is not invalid merely because it happened wholly or partly through electronic communications.

    Scam warning

    Victoria’s legal regulator says to pause before opening any link or attachment from someone you were not expecting to hear from.

    Signing the contract electronically

  3. Source: land.vic.gov.auScreen 3 of 5 · Identity

    The identity check: proving the seller is the owner

    Rule

    In Victoria, every party to a conveyancing transaction has to have their identity verified, and a lawyer or conveyancer acting for a client takes reasonable steps to verify it.

    Scam warning

    Queensland’s Office of Fair Trading says scammers try to pose as the true owners of a property, and some properties have been sold without the true owners knowing.

    Proving who you are

  4. Source: registrargeneral.nsw.gov.auScreen 4 of 5 · Settlement

    The settlement: money and title move in one network

    Rule

    In NSW, since 11 October 2021, every land transaction that has to be lodged with NSW Land Registry Services is done electronically.

    Scam warning

    In a January 2016 warning, Victoria’s legal regulator described scammers intercepting emails between clients and their solicitors and moving just before a large payment was due; it had not yet found the same fraud among Victorian clients.

    Electronic settlement, state by state

  5. Source: scamwatch.gov.auScreen 5 of 5 · Payment

    The payment: the account number in an email

    Official advice

    Scamwatch: “Don't use the contact details in the email as they might have been changed by the scammer.”

    Scam warning

    Scamwatch: “One of the most common scams affecting Aussie businesses and their customers is the payment redirection scam.”

    Payment redirection scams and the official checks

Source: lsbc.vic.gov.auOne habit for every screen

The address bar is the check

Victoria’s Legal Services Commissioner gives a check that works on all five screens: before paying a business online, confirm who you are dealing with by typing the business’s published web address into your browser yourself.

That is why each screen on this site carries the address of the government site it relies on. An address typed in by hand leads to the real page; a link in an unexpected message may not. The same regulator’s advice for a changed account number is to “call them to confirm”, using a number you already hold.

What is coveredSix states, the ACT and Scamwatch

Which states, and what is left out

The rules here come from the official pages of NSW, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia, Tasmania and the ACT, and from Scamwatch. Each rule is stated for the state its source gives it for. The Northern Territory is not covered here.

Electronic settlement in Western Australia is outside this guide; Consumer Protection WA’s page on property settlement describes the process there.