Russell Smith is President & Chief Operating Officer at Earnnest – How Money Moves in Real Estate. Russell and his team at Earnnest are on a mission to remove payment fraud from the real estate equation by replacing checks and wires with fast, secure digital payments. To date, Earnnest has facilitated over 400,000 digital earnest money deposits without a single instance of fraud. Prior to joining Earnnest, Russell held multiple roles leading teams and scaling new ventures at HouseCanary, RealScout, and Trulia. He was named as a HousingWire “Rising Star” in 2020 and a “Newsmaker” by Real Estate Magazine in 2023.