Multimillion-dollar lawsuits, an abandoned luxury SUV and a sudden lack of communication are all parts of a mystery police are trying to unravel in thedisappearance of a Toronto-area lawyer. Isabella Dan, 53, hasnt been seen in almost three weeks, leaving her friends and police stumped as to her whereabouts.

The body that regulates Ontario's100,000 real estate agents and brokers isurging them to be more vigilant when verifying the identity of a client, amid a wave of fraudulent home salesand mortgages in the Toronto area.

The same fraudulent driver's licence was used to rent two Toronto homes that organized crime tried to sell without the homeowner's knowledge, according to a private investigator working on the cases.

CBC Toronto has learned a handful of organized crime groups are behind these real-estate frauds in which at least 30 homes in the Greater Toronto Area have either been sold or mortgaged without the real owners' knowledge. Those revelations come from a private investigation firm working for a title insurance company to try and get to the bottom of the scams, which are costing insurers millions in claims.