The Title Insurance Ripoff
Thursday, January 29th, 2009
Title insurance is a necessary evil, but many don’t realize how evil. You probably don’t realize that a full 70% of the title insurance premium you pay is kicked back to the settlement attorney handling the settlement.
In a commercial real estate settlement, this can be a very large figure. In a $5 million sale I handled recently, the buyer paid almost $14,000 in premiums.
While it doesn’t seem like a lot in the context of the sixe of the transaction, There’s no reason that you can’t negotiate with your settlement attorney, particularly in these tough times, to make sure you’re getting a fair break. The attorney deserves to make a living, but keep him or her honest, and let them know that you know about how profitable a transaction this can be for them and that you’d like to share in that.
Better yet, start a title company!
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