In another thread, JKinAK wrote:
JKinAK, post: 394718, member: 7219 wrote: Don't be so sure. Some are experts and some are not - there are no education or training requirements to become a title examiner in many (maybe most - maybe all) states. It looks like Indiana land title folks have some self awarded designations titled "Indiana Title Professional" but these don't appear to be mandatory or regulated by the state.
It is unusual to find title insurance staff with the title expertise of a seasoned boundary surveyor. Yes, there are some title insurance folks who do know there stuff really well - just don't take it for granted that they do - at $13-19.50/hour (per indianaskills.com) it's hard to come by experts.
So...when you are working on ALTA/NSPS surveys who do you usually deal with at the title insurance company? I'd venture to guess that for me its:
a.) 70% Seasoned attorneys (20+ years experience)
b.) 15% Attorneys less than ten years out of law school
c.) 15% Paralegals who work under "a"
It may just be a factor of the market I work in, but I don't think I've ever dealt with someone who fell under the title of "generic title examiner" (or anyone making less that $45/hour for that matter)
In the market I work in, I've never dealt with an attorney at a title insurance company. We rarely do ALTA/NSPS surveys so I can't say that the title folks involved in ALTA/NSPS surveys aren't all of the caliber you describe.
We do support the acquisition of a lot of rights-of-way parcels for the public and we subdivide a fair amount of land. I'm not aware of any folks from your list being directly involved in the last 50 real estate acquisitions (none ALTA/NSPS) - they could have been behind the scenes but when I have questions, I've never been referred to the title company attorney.
My experience (which is clearly different than yours) suggests that ALTA title policies seem to be more about risk statistics (as is all insurance) than defining and mapping property rights. Title companies in our area identify title risk and eliminate it through limits of obligation and exclusions and exceptions. Identifying all rights affecting a parcel of land isn't so important when you do this correctly. Sometimes this can leave the client (purchaser/owner) at significant risk.
My goals as a surveyor are different than the title companies goals. My client is typically the individual acquiring the property or the owner and I strive to protect them by identifying and locating all property rights affecting the subject parcel (which in some cases includes adjoining rights - sometimes for better and sometimes for worse).
7yrs ago I did an ALTA on a 150 acre commercial site. We did get a waiver on half of it because it was across a public road and was totally timber.
When I sent it to the Title Company they did not know what they had because it was their first ALTA and probably their last.
I had to go down the requirement list item by item and explain the survey to them.
So, the mileage of experience varies from place to place and locally their has been a turnover in their employees every couple of years for the last 15yrs.
What is proper and what happens is not always the same according to management. It is usually what management is willing to insure and they adjust their rates according to the number of disclaimers they waive.
:scream:
I don't do many ALTA surveys anymore - one every few years or so - but when I do I typically deal only with the escrow officer. If there's an obvious problem I can usually elevate the contact to the title officer, but as others have noted, knowledgeable title officers are becoming scarce.
The only attorneys I encounter in the process are those employed by the lender, and their job seems to be to needlessly complicate the project rather than to clarify title matters.
I have dealt with them all. Typically I prefer to discuss most things with the Title officer responsible for the report. If things need to elevate, in comes senior title council for Large Box Title company and then underwriter.
Don't do many any more and that's fine with me. Normally, the contact is very limited and run through the owner of the tract. On a couple of occasions I have had to speak with title company attorneys. The funniest one was a young lady more or less fresh out of law school and working in an office in Philadelphia. She didn't have a clue about how to handle much of anything that wasn't cut and dried already. This was particularly fun because the property was in a section of a small city that had gone through a plat vacation about 120 years earlier. The problem was that everyone, including the city, had pretty much ignored the vacation. Lots were described as : Lots 1,2 and 3 of Block 7, Park Place Addition as vacated by .................. Weird, right? There were city streets running down the center of the vacated platted streets and graveled alleys running down the vacated alleys with regular trash truck service using them.
I do a fair amount of ALTA surveys. Probably 30 a year. For the first time in 20+ years, I recently had a title company ask me if the Restrictive Covenants regarding race discrimination and the lease contract dollar amounts affect the subject property and if they should issue a policy on the property.