WHAYYDA MEAN I CAN’T GET TITLE INSURANCE ON A SHORT SALE ?

By Dave Krieger

Not time for the “I told you so speech” … but the tell-tale signs that the title companies are starting to get nervous about insuring distressed properties is now starting to manifest itself. A Realtor for Keller-Williams in Kansas City had a $600,000 short sale cash buyer all ready to go. The house was worth over a million bucks and the bank agreed to let it go for substantially less and everyone (well almost everyone) was happy. Imagine the commission on a price tag like that … at 6% you’d be looking at splitting a $36,000 check 4 ways (generally) at $9,000 a pop. Now imagine the agony when you are told by Chicago Title that you are denied title insurance until the backlog of clouds on title gets cleared up. Chicago Title is one of many major players in the insurance game that is seeking to limit its exposure created by problems surrounding the broken chains of title that the securitization of residential mortgage-backed loans has created, especially with MERS dicing up the chains of title of over 62-million (or 60% of all current) mortgage loans electronically registered. (more…)