After months of surveying and analyzing the data from the responses of more than 400 title professionals regarding their challenges and successes, we are ready to share our biggest takeaways about the State of the Title Industry. Read on to join the conversation.
The State of the Title Industry survey and subsequent report is meant to give a pulse on the various challenges and successes experiences by title industry professionals. A lot of the responses we received were exactly as we expected them to be, but there were some standout points that we’re sharing in the videos below as we discuss the most surprising takeaways.
Closers are juggling too many different responsibilities
Title work and clearance is something that takes the utmost care and attention to detail. What respondents told us is that they’re juggling too many different responsibilities and as a result, have to rush through tasks to get them done. Between all the task to get to closing, dealing with client outreach, balancing changing regulations, monitoring compliance, and trying to bring in new business, they’re drowning. How do they prevent letting something slip through the cracks? See the next point.
It’s less taboo than ever to get help from outsource solutions
From title searches to municipal lien searches, more title professionals are turning to an outsource solution which allows them to control fixed costs and keep a variable cost model. According to our survey, the title professionals we surveyed said the biggest benefit of outsourcing is that it allows them to focus on other important closing tasks, which is what both closers and title company owners said. The second-biggest benefit to company owners is that they believe third-party experts can perform certain tasks better, or faster than the company can.
Concerns over outsourcing are less about cost and more about control
As a third-party vendor who helps title professionals with ancillary closing due diligence tasks, we often here companies telling us that they can’t justify the cost of using a third-party, but our survey shows that less people are really concerned about how much it costs, or even that their competitors are still doing things in-house. Their number one hesitation when it comes to outsourcing is less control around turnaround times. Since we’re all at the mercy of municipalities, association management companies, etc., it can feel like the process takes even longer when you go through a “middle-man.” However, if you’re working with the right partners, you should always be kept in the loop. This it why it’s crucial to properly vet vendors and ensure you’ll get real-time updates as to the status of your orders.
Title pros were unexpectedly candid in their self-evaluation
We threw in a wild card question in the survey, asking what respondents thought about their peers’ due diligence and their own. As expected, title professionals don’t have the utmost confidence in their peers. Why should they, though, when we found that 94% of them have had to clean up title issues neglected by a previous closing? What did surprise us is that 25% of respondents thought they could be doing a better job of due diligence themselves. Humble to admit that you could be doing better, but admitting it is the first step to improvement!
Thank you to all those who took their time to take our survey! Comment below to let us know what you think about the results of the State of the Title Industry.
Didn’t get a chance to see the full report? Download it below!
