For many first-time home buyers, the process of buying a home can be quite overwhelming. You need to have a team of people you can trust to make the process as smooth as possible, and even then, the amount of paperwork and the requirements for securing a mortgage can make anyone second guess their decision to buy a home. When you are buying a home, there are quite a few people you must work with. You have the realtor, the mortgage broker, the home inspector, and, of course, you are working closely with us as we take care of all the legal matters. With all the people that you have met, there is one person at the closing that you had probably never met, yet that person was a vital part of getting to the closing. This person is the title examiner.
What does the title examiner do?
When you buy a house or a piece of property, chances are, even if the house was just built, the land itself has been bought and sold several times going back potentially hundreds of years. Before you can buy a property, we must make sure that the property is able to be sold. If there are any liens on the property, or there are open permits or there are others who claim to own the property in question, these issues will have to be dealt with before you can take possession of the property and the house.
Checking all of these things is the job of the title examiner, also called a title abstractor, or title searcher. A title examiner will search through public records and examine the titles on a property to determine the legal condition of the property itself. Documents that can be searched include previous mortgages, trusts, and contacts that may affect the title of the property. They will also check to ensure there are not open permits on the land or structures that were not properly closed out by previous owners.
Title Insurance Protects the Homeowner
This is done to make sure that no one came step forward and claim legal ownership of the property in question. Once the examiner is satisfied that there are no legal obstacles that could stop the sale, a title agent can issue title insurance to the homeowner. Title insurance guarantees proper homeownership and legally protects you against any subsequent claims that be brought by anyone who says they have legal rights to the land or that they are owed money from a previous owner’s mortgage or other loan.
For many homeowners, the title examiner is just another person at the closing table and potentially another check they need to write before the transaction is complete.By the time they are at the closing table, most people just want the process to be done so they start the newest chapter of their lives.Most people do not realize what is happening behind the scenes and why it takes several months to get to the closing.Even though most people may not know what a title examiner does, the step is so vital that the closing cannot proceed without it.