Yes, this scam does happen often in the real estate industry. My professional background is in IT, but I did study real estate and land use affairs. I dabbled in the industry for a while, and see many instances of the fraudulent wiring instructions. Good closing companies enforce policies about wiring transfers and I would also hope buyers do their due diligence by selecting a good real estate professional that would take the time to educate the buyer on such issues. It does help that many of the real estate documents are now e-signed, so the buyer has to be sure to follow the instructions on those set of "private" documents. Following instructions from other avenues would result in the phishing activity you mentioned.

Thanks for stopping by @kimor!