What is title insurance?
Lender’s Title Insurance: Protects Lender’s interests; insures mortgage principal balance; expires when mortgage is paid off
Owner’s Title Insurance: Protects homeowner’s interests; insures against losses due to title defects; one premium payment at close; remains in effect as long as you own your home.
What it covers: title search mistakes; errors in public records; forged documents; undisclosed or missing heirs; liens for unpaid prior taxes; claims arising from non-probated wills; legal fees to defend against claims.
Do I qualify for reduced premiums?
The requirements to obtain the re-issue or reduced rate for your title insurance (in Florida) are pretty straight forward. You only need your prior title policy for the identical land involved in the current transaction, as long as you are the person on title. The reissue rates are stated below. You are entitled to the reissue rate whether the new transaction is insured by the prior title insurer or a new insurer. This means you do not have to use the same title company to close your transaction or refinance that was used for the prior transaction. For a sale/purchase the policy must be less than 3 years but for a refinance, the policy never expires for a discount!
Title Insurance Reissue Rates
The Florida Administrative Code sets the premium for title insurance policies issued within 3 years of a previous policy (for sales/purchase) at:
- $3.30 per thousand for policies up to $100,000
- $3.00 per thousand for policies over $100,000 and up to $1 million
- $2.00 per thousand for policies over $1 million and up to $10 million
- $1.50 per thousand for policies over $10 million
- If you are interested in knowing what your title insurance premium will be for your purchase or refinance, please contact Advantage Title Group at 850-329-6920.
Tips for Realtors to expedite title search process
To help expedite the process of your closing, please provide your title company with the following information when you deliver the purchase contract: names, address, telephone and email for buyers/sellers. What is the buyer/seller’s marital status? Was it the seller’s homestead? Will it be buyer’s homestead? If buyer or seller is a Trust or Estate, please ask them to provide copies of the documents showing who is authorized to sign. A new survey or prior survey (with affidavit of no changes) is required for purchases and refinances. Ask your sellers at the listing appointment if there is a mortgage on their property. If so, who with and provide account number and last four of their SSN (this expedites getting payoffs right away rather than waiting until the title search to comes back).
