Todayā€™s businesses face a unique challenge. They must find ways to showcase their trustworthiness to audiences that are increasingly distracted. That challenge becomes even more important in title insurance.

Businesses are continually signaling to audiences in various ways whether or not they are trustworthy. At the audience level, those trust signals can include everything from a modern website and responsive communication to customer reviews, branding and clear messaging. But once an audience member becomes a customer, another level of trust is required. Customers need to understand both your commitment to protecting the integrity of their transaction and the critical steps they need to take to help keep it secure. Letā€™s see what it takes to do both.

Step 1: Segment strategically

Creating trust signals that feel meaningful but still respectful of your audienceā€™s time starts by understanding them. Your audience is not a monolith. It is an array of constituencies, each with their own motivations, fears and needs. Considering ā€œbuyer personasā€ is a great way to begin building trust. You will then better understand what each audience member is looking for from a title agency and know how to position your services in a way that grabs a buyerā€™s attention.

When building out these personas, resist overthinking it. Simply ask what each audience segment is worried about, what they need to do next and how much they already understand. That way, you can cut right to the chase and highlight why you are best positioned to meet their needs and address their fears. For example, is your buyer purchasing their first home or are they a seasoned homeowner facing the digital closing process for the first time?

Step 2: Put fraud prevention front and center

As you build your customer personas, you will also need to convey to each of them the inherent risks in todayā€™s fraud landscape. At °µĶų³Ō¹Ļ, we encourage agents to adopt a simple principle: VERIFY, THEN TRUST: Every file, every party, every time. The challenge is bringing consumers into that mindset in a clear and practical way. Real estate transactions, where hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars are exchanged, remain attractive targets for scammers, and customers may not fully understand the threat level, especially when they are caught up in the many moving pieces of a transaction. This represents an obvious opportunity to build greater trust. By making your agencyā€™s fraud-prevention practices as visible as possible, you can help your customers feel more secure in your ability to protect the integrity of their transactions, while also helping them understand the role they play in keeping those transactions safe and maintaining the necessary protections of their personal information and assets.

Some best practices for getting customers the information they require without overburdening them include:

• Make fraud warnings obvious: Place short, clear reminders in all emails, website pages and other customer-facing materials and always encourage the exchange of critical information through your secure agency closing portal.Ģż
• Avoid jargon: Customers need a quick and crystal-clear understanding of your ID verification practices, secure portals and other anti-fraud proceduresā€”written in plain English.Ģż
• Give customers a safe point of contact: Provide a designated point of contact upfront, along with instructions on which number to use and which situations merit a pause, particularly before sending funds. Customers should be reminded that if something changes or feels unusual, they should not rely on a recent email or another communication stream. They should return to the original contact information you provided and verify before taking the next step. For example, your customers should always be reminded that you will NEVER change your wire instructions at the last minute. Direct them to the trusted point of contact should they receive such a direction.
• Create standard fraud-prevention language: Ensure your customers receive the same guidance at every touchpoint. Team training is important here. Your team should continually reinforce the same messages and procedures, so the guidance does not get muddled and consumers do not become disengaged. The threat level is high and customers need to appreciate that from the minute their transaction is initiated.

With these steps, even the most distracted and scattered audience will more easily understand your commitment to keeping their transactions secure. That builds trust in your organization while also helping customers understand the steps they can takeā€”and need to takeā€”to help protect their transaction. Your customers have a critical role to play, but trusting that you will guide them appropriately and safely will be a valuable tool in their protection.

Step 3: Visuals are very important

Ensuring your agency exudes credibility and trustworthiness begins with your website. Adhering to modern web design practices, using consistent fonts and colors and ensuring mobile responsiveness are all non-negotiable. Reviewing client-facing forms for accuracy, correct branding and messaging, particularly around fraud, and a smooth user experience is also important, as is auditing the communications and physical documentation that come from your agency.

Be the resource that your customers require. Secure links to checklists for closings, fraud prevention tips, and frequently asked questions and answers make certain to your customer that you are their reliable resource throughout the closing process. You are the resource they can trust at every stage.

Step 4: Review your reviews

Remember: The communication channels you ā€œownā€ are just the tip of the iceberg for establishing trust. Todayā€™s audiences are channel switchers. When choosing a company in which to place their trust, they will vet not only your site and social media channels, but also third-party sites, reviews and customer feedback.

You need to be similarly active in these spaces. Whether it be your Google Business Profile or various review sites, you must be ready to respond to questions, offer advice or address complaints. If you do this well, time-crunched prospects will see you as a convenient and communicative business partner. If you donā€™t, you risk disengagement. Make a customer satisfaction survey part of the post-closing outreach to your customers. Allow them to sing your praises or learn from your mistakes to enhance the next transaction experience. 

Step 5: Highlight the human

Last but certainly not least, few things help build trust and relationship as much as highlighting the human element of your business. As we all know, relationships are everything in the title and settlement industry.  Sometimes in real estate transactions, the human factor can feel lost under procedures and paperwork, which is a big problem when trying to elevate your agencyā€™s credibility. Overcoming this means connecting customers to the specific people they will engage with as their closing moves to completion. Clarifying roles and reinforcing the verification steps customers should follow before acting on transaction instructions is also critical to a positive and trust-based customer experience.

VERIFY, THEN TRUST is at the heart of our business

It can be a real struggle to help customers feel comfortable and confident enough to entrust you with their transactionsā€¦and their MONEY! One reason is that itā€™s becoming an enormous lift to even connect with customers in our fragmented and fluid digital age. Thatā€™s where these trust-building steps can make a difference. By showing customers that you are committed to protecting their transactionsā€”and by helping them understand their own role in the processā€”you can build trust, which will benefit your customers and your agencyā€™s future success through referrals from satisfied customers.

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What is the ideal MSP relationship?

Before diving into metrics, letā€™s briefly review how an ideal MSP relationship should function. A good MSP partner is fundamentally strategic, technologically savvy, transparent and responsive. Hereā€™s what each of these means in greater detail:

• Strategic: A valuable MSP partner understands your core business goals, market and customers, and will align your technology stack to support short- and long-term priorities.
• Transparent: A good MSP is similarly transparent. The engagement should include regular check-in calls. Your service level agreement (SLA) should be clear, straightforward, and easy to understand. And all issues, limitations, problems and solutions should be communicated swiftly and clearly.
• Technologically-savvy: An ideal MSPā€™s technological solutions and recommendations are always ahead of the curve and ensure your business stays competitive and secure. MSP relationships with strong ROI are those that proactively educate and equip your team with what they need to succeed.
• Responsive: You only want to workwith an MSP that can act as a true extension of your in-house team. That means they prioritize responsiveness in all areas of their work, from technical breakdowns to emerging cybersecurityissues to planned system upgrades.

MSP providers that meet these criteria represent the gold standard, often helping their clients achieve greater productivity and profitability.

Top metrics for determining MSP ROI

You can assess the ROI of an MSP by looking at each of these characteristics in detail using qualitative and quantitative data points. This will give you a holistic view of how your MSP is impacting your business ā€“ for better or worse.

The top metrics for assessing if your MSP is setting you up for smart, strategic and long-term growth are:

• Time-to-market: Measures how fast your MSP can get new solutions up and running.
• % of IT projects completed on time/budget: Parses how effectively MSPs implement technology upgrades without cost and time overruns.
• Adoption rate: Gauges how successfully new solutions are being adopted across your business.
• Revenue and productivity growth: Tracks MSP impact on your businessā€™s bottom line and worker productivity.
• Business continuity/disaster recovery readiness scores: This assesses your organization’s readiness to respond effectively and recover swiftly in the unfortunate event of a disaster.

After you get a sense of how effective your MSP is from a strategy perspective, you can examine transparency and responsiveness:

• Service agreement adherence: Delves into whether your MSP is meeting the obligations detailed in the service agreement signed at the beginning of the engagement.
• Review schedule: Monitors whether check-ins, cadence calls and quarterly business reviews (QBRs) are happening consistently.
• Resolutions within agreed-upon timelines: Ensures reliability and accountability by confirming that IT issues are resolved promptly within established timelines.
• Billing accuracy and clarity: This ensures MSP invoices are aligned with contracted services and conveyed in an easy-to-interpret fashion.
• Internal stakeholder satisfaction: Captures how important constituencies within your organization feel about the MSP relationship.

Lastly, youā€™ll want to determine your MSPā€™s technical chops to understand if they are putting you on competitive footing and future-proofing your tech stack:

• Number of migrations from legacy systems: Delves into how effectively your MSP is upgrading your IT environment.
• Cybersecurity audit pass rates: Analyzes the impact your MSP is having on your security posture and its ability to respond to an unpredictable threat landscape.
• End-user satisfaction: Illuminates if your MSP is enabling workers to streamline workflows and elevate productivity.

MSPs: A critical relationship that merits careful consideration

Enlisting an MSP to manage your IT is an important step that can either trip up your business or propel it to new heights. But the only way to know whether you are getting a positive ROI is by carefully assessing your MSP from various angles. By tracking whether your MSP is strategic, transparent, responsive and technically-savvy, youā€™ll better understand if the partnership is working and whether your MSP should remain a part of your IT team for many years to come.

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Millions of businesses in the U.S. today outsource part or all their IT needs to a third party such as a managed service provider (MSP), and it is not difficult to understand why. Working with an MSP can deliver big benefits for a company, such as cost savings, increased efficiency and lessening the burden on internal IT teams. Yet finding the right provider can be a tall order to say the least. To make it easier, weā€™ve created a handy checklist covering the six important considerations you should look for when selecting an MSP. Armed with this knowledge, youā€™ll be better prepared to make an informed decision that will pay off for your company both now and for many years to come.

Six considerations for your future MSP

ā˜ Deep and varied cybersecurity expertise ā€“ The threat landscape facing agencies today is ever-evolving, complex and highly dangerous. Agencies face familiar threats like phishing, fraud, and identity theftā€”but also more advanced ones like business email compromise, ransomware, and social engineering. Any MSP you consider should be capable of delivering a multi-layered security solution to deal with these challenges ā€” covering everything from secure email gateways and endpoint detection to 24/7 monitoring and disaster recovery plans.

ā˜ Industry experience ā€“ When it comes to IT outsourcing, one size definitely doesnā€™t fit all. To get the best bang for their buck, agencies should try to work with MSPs who have experience with the insurance industry and its regulatory environment. Seasoned providers will intuitively understand an agencyā€™s IT needs and deliver a more robust and secure setup at less cost.

ā˜ Dedicated account manager and responsive support ā€“ Think of your MSP as a partnerā€”not a one-and-done provider. Rather, agencies need to approach it as a strategic, long-term and iterative relationship. The reasons why are straightforward. As oneā€™s agency grows and changes over the years, so too will its IT needs. Similarly, technology systems and cybersecurity best practices are never static, meaning that an agencyā€™s setup will need continuous updating, migration and adjustment as time goes by. All this makes it essential to work with MSPs equipped to offer a dedicated account manager and responsive support team. These professionals make sure your tech keeps pace with evolving threatsā€”backed by personal attention and clear communication. Overall, they serve as a powerful vanguard against cybercrime and a catalyst for a more digitally savvy business.

ā˜ User training ā€“ Did you know that one of the top reasons why businesses experience a security breach is user error? In fact, data shows nearly 9 out of 10 breaches are related in some way to employee mistakes.[i] MSPs can help businesses mitigate this risk, reduce the potential for errors and safeguard themselves when operating online through tailored instruction and support. Agencies should inquire with each provider if they offer security awareness training as part of their contract. It is one of the best ways to reduce attack vectors and create better protections for sensitive data, systems and other digital assets.

ā˜ Keep it local if possible ā€“ Partnering with a local MSP offers several advantages over working with a remote-only provider. A local MSP can deliver faster on-site support when urgent technical issues arise, minimizing downtime and ensuring smoother operations. They also better understand the local business environment, compliance requirements, and infrastructure challenges unique to your region. This proximity fosters stronger relationships, more personalized service and greater accountability, making the MSP a true extension of your internal team.

ā˜ Proven track record ā€“ Lastly, agencies should not only look at vendor reviews during their MSP selection process but also relevant certifications. One of the most important to consider would be SOC 2 Type II, which verifies if an MSP adheres to strict controls for data security, confidentiality and privacy. Another would be ISO/IEC 27001, which is the gold standard for securely managing information security. Other certifications worth investigating include CompTIA Security+, for threat and response protocols; MSP Verify/MSPAlliance Certification, which deals with service delivery and risk management issues; and, finally, a Microsoft Solutions Provider certification, which has an obvious, practical application for any agency that utilizes Microsoft products. When a provider has certifications like these, it not only speaks to their technical capabilities but also highlights their commitment to transparency and open, honest communicationā€”all qualities agencies will want to prioritize with a vendor relationship.

Select the right MSP for better business results

In a digital-first business environment like ours, how a company chooses to approach their IT management and cybersecurity needs can be a make-or-break decision. Outsourcing to an MSP is one potential route, and when you find the right partner, the results can be transformative. Yet sourcing, vetting and inking a deal with an MSP can be a whirlwind and overwhelming process, particularly when trying to also manage your companyā€™s day-to-day activities. This checklist can help you cut through the noise and zero in on what really matters. And in the end, it can lead to partnership with a technology provider that amplifies your companyā€™s productivity and profitability, all while keeping your systems, staff and data safe.

[i]

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Marketing your title agency can sometimes feel like a beast. And if youā€™re trying to market while also managing your day-to-day operations, that beast can become a full-on monsterā€”like the legendary Hydra. If you remember your Greek mythology, the hero Hercules struggled greatly when fighting that creature. Every time he cut off one head, two more would appear. Without a clear marketing strategy, itā€™s easy for challenges to start piling up, and campaigns may not achieve the intended results, such as a strong ROI or high client engagement.

°µĶų³Ō¹Ļ has created The Ultimate Marketing Checklist for Title Agencies to help you navigate these challenges efficiently. With this comprehensive guide, youā€™ll ensure your marketing efforts are effective and well-targeted.

1. Define your target audience:

To be effective, any marketing effort should start with a careful analysis of your target audiences by following the steps below:

ā˜ Identify key audiences: Determine who your primary stakeholders are, including real estate agents, homebuyers, sellers and lenders.

ā˜ Research pain points: Work to understand each of these audiences on a deeper level by parsing their specific needs and challenges.

ā˜ Build customer personas: Take this initial research and expand it into a comprehensive profile of each stakeholder group. If you need help getting started, check out our full blog on the subject.

ā˜ Segment messaging: The last step is to customize your messages for each audience segment.

2. Develop a strong brand identity:

Proper branding is a must for agencies seeking to stand out in a crowded marketplace. Ensure you have taken the following steps:

ā˜ Create a brand style guide: Establish your agencyā€™s colors, fonts, logos, tone, and brand voice to ensure consistency across all marketing materials. This consistency helps to build recognition and trust with your audience. If you want to dig into the details of branding, review our blog here.

ā˜ Establish unique value propositions (UVPs): Communicate why your agency stands out. We recently authored a blog on how you can develop your UVPs by crafting a strategic messaging framework.

ā˜ Design professional materials: Finally, deploy your branding across collateral, including business cards, social media and email signatures. Donā€™t have a designer? We have tips for how you can master graphic design basics and produce high quality materials at a low cost.

3. Optimize your website:

Your website is your agencyā€™s digital front door and is often the first impression potential clients have of your business. In the title industry, an informative, easy-to-use website is crucial for establishing trust. Follow these best practices to connect and convert visitors.

ā˜ Ensure mobile responsiveness: People need to be able to view your site easily across devices ā€“ including desktops, laptops, tablets and phones. Use our blog to begin optimizing your content for mobile and multi-device audiences.

ā˜ Implement SEO basics: Add relevant keywords, page hierarchies, ALT text and meta descriptions across your website. Refer to our blog for instructions on getting started with the basics of SEO.

ā˜ Add lead capture forms: Use forms to capture new leads and drive additional business.

ā˜ Provide valuable resources: Developing title-centric FAQs, blog posts, white papers and guides can help increase your website traffic. And even if you donā€™t have a lot of time, you can still try things like micro-blogging!

ā˜ Integrate analytics tools: Verify whether you have analytics set up to track traffic and user behavior.

4. Build your social media presence:

Social media is vital for growing brand awareness and engagement. Take the following actions to get the best results:

ā˜ Choose platforms: Select platforms where your audience is, which probably includes some mix of LinkedIn, Facebook and X.

ā˜ Develop a content strategy: Post educational, promotional and interactive content. This could encompass everything from industry insights, to case studies, to client testimonials. Use a content calendar to stay focused, and find further guidance on developing a content strategy on our blog.

ā˜ Get social: Remember ā€“ social media is not meant to be a bullhorn. Engage with followers by liking their posts and resharing their content. Thatā€™s the best way to build mutually beneficial relationships.

5. Establish content and email marketing programs:

Through the power of content and email marketing, you can increase your website traffic and achieve better marketing ROI. Here is how to get started.

ā˜ Create valuable and educational content: Write blogs and other educational content assets that your audience will find interesting, including title insurance best practices, trends and closing optimization tips.

ā˜ Track with a content calendar: As with social media, carefully track the development, creation and dissemination of each asset. Include dates, deadlines and communication channels.

ā˜ Use visuals: Make your content more visual to get higher engagement. Infographics and videos are just two examples of how to do this. For tips on building great video content, refer to our blog.

ā˜ Optimize for SEO: Donā€™t skimp out on SEO for your assets hosted on your website. Thatā€™s the best way to ensure that people who are not on your email list can find your content.

ā˜ Send a regular newsletter: A newsletter is a fantastic way to build long-lasting connections with your audience. Our blog can help get you started.

ā˜ Segment and personalize emails: Set up your email marketing software and start building out your lists. Segment your contacts to make your mailings personalized and relevant. Also, never spam people. Weā€™ve prepared an article on why gaining consent for your email marketing is always a good idea.

6. Take advantage of events:

Industry events are an exceptional way to network, showcase your services and form valuable connections with customers or other stakeholders. Hereā€™s how to approach events strategically.

ā˜ Find industry events: ALTA and state-specific title associations often host events. Industry calendars and social media groups are other great resources.

ā˜ Prepare marketing collateral: Bring branded materials to help fully highlight your agency. Bring along business cards, brochures, newsletter sign-up sheets and more.

ā˜ Create a promotional plan: Take steps to promote how you are participating in an event. Read our blog for a step-by-step guide.

7. Nurture your customer relationships:

Marketing to clients you have is just as important as marketing to those youā€™re trying to win. Donā€™t miss these opportunities by taking advantage of these steps.

ā˜ Establish a client communication plan: Develop a mechanism to ensure a consistentstream of client communications. These touch points can be added to your content calendar as well.

ā˜ Celebrate milestones: Sendingpersonalized communications aroundanniversaries, birthdays or transactions is a wonderful way to reinforce relationships.

ā˜ Seek feedback: Offer clients the chance to share their feedback through a digital channel like an online survey.

8. Monitor and track your performance:

Finally, tracking metrics is the only way to determine marketing ROI and refine future campaigns. Hereā€™s how to do that.

ā˜ Track website metrics: Become familiar with Google Analytics. Some top metrics to track include traffic, bounce rates and conversions.

ā˜ Assess social media engagement: Just as important as your website are your social media metrics. Here are some tips to help you learn about the most important analytics to monitor.

ā˜ Review email campaign data: Track every email campaign as well by looking at numbers like email open rates, click-throughs and bounce percentages.

ā˜ Stay current with your CRM: Understand different CRM metrics to track client behavior and streamline processes. Review the top metrics to track here, and if you donā€™t have a CRM yet but are considering one, our blog can help guide you.

ā˜ Adjust based on results: Lastly, carve out time to discuss the performance of your various marketing campaigns and adjust accordingly.

Slay the marketing monster once and for all

We hope you find this checklist helpful as you build stronger, more strategic marketing campaigns. By following these steps and referencing our blog, youā€™ll be well-equipped to slay the marketing monster once and for all. With the right strategy, you can take your marketing to the next level and drive real growth for your agency.

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What is client-side encryption?

You have likely heard about encryption and perhaps even use such technology at your agency. After all, encryption technologies have been in place across multiple industries for decades. CSE is a more recent innovation. It offers users greater control over when and where their data is encrypted, and over who can decrypt this information.

How does it differ from traditional encryption?

CSE technology differs from traditional methods of encryption in two key aspects: where the actual encryption occurs and who controls the encryption keys. When using CSE, data is usually encrypted on a userā€™s local device before being sent to a server or shared over a cloud network. Access to this data is similarly held by the user, which means that the data remains completely inaccessible to a service or network provider.

How CSE can benefit your agency

There are clear security implications for your agency when you choose to implement CSE. CSE can help strengthen defenses against data breaches and other criminal activity. When equipped with this technology, agencies are freed from relying on third-party providers to manage security keys. Even if your network or service provider goes down or is compromised in some way, your data will remain safe and secure. Additionally, CSE gives companies greater control over who can decrypt their data, allowing them to align access permissions with organizational policies or user roles.

For highly regulated businesses like title insurance, CSE may be particularly advantageous. Title agencies are required to meet various compliance obligations, which include taking steps to ensure consumer security and privacy. CSE can directly help with these requirements.

Be future-ready with CSE

CSE doesnā€™t just have immediate benefits; it can also help your agency prepare for future challenges. For example, data protection laws are expanding throughout the world and the United States, imposing ever-more-stringent regulations on how businesses operate online. Data sovereignty laws are similarly growing, mandating that organizational data stay within a specific geographical location. Lastly, the rise of AI and quantum computing is upending many current encryption methodologies.  

CSE holds great promise for agencies looking to navigate these seismic changes. It can ensure data is immediately encrypted at the source where it is created, thus satisfying key data protection provisions. It can empower companies to maintain control over encryption keys and not rely on providers who may be hundreds of miles away. And it provides enhanced security that can help agencies use AI safely while preparing for the next wave of cryptography advances.

Consider CSE for your encryption needs For title businesses, protecting sensitive organizational and customer data is non-negotiable. Encryption has long been the go-to method for accomplishing this goal, but traditional technologies may be insufficient for the changing digital environment. Client-side encryption offers potential advantages by encrypting data right at the source and ensuring that access is strictly maintained. Companies that adopt it no longer need to rely on third parties, can more easily comply with regulations, and are better prepared to leverage emerging technologies. In a competitive business environment like ours, those are benefits worth considering.

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Contract for deed agreements are frequently not recorded in the county land records. However, as an example, Texas requires executory contracts be recorded by the seller within thirty (30) days from the date of execution or the seller may be liable for damages to the other party for noncompliance. In Texas, such a recorded executory contract is treated as a deed with a vendorā€™s lien. See Tex. Prop. Code Ā§ 5.076 and 5.079. Other states also have statutes addressing executory contracts.

Contract for deed agreements have been the subject of many lawsuits. Generally, a lawsuit can be the first opportunity for a non-party to know that an unrecorded contract for deed agreement exists. A claimant is either sued or discovers the conflict through other communication, typically from the equitable interest holder. The claimant, at times, files a notice under its title insurance policy seeking coverage for such disputes. As each case is different and depending on the specific title policy, a coverage determination will be unique to the situation. Therefore, it is important to be aware that contract for deed agreements exist and that they may impact a new buyerā€™s title or a lienholderā€™s interest in the property.

The claims team has encountered situations involving contract for deeds. For example, a lender may be preparing a foreclosure action involving a recorded mortgage or deed of trust when it discovers a lawsuit naming the lenderā€™s borrower. The plaintiff alleges it entered into a contract for deed agreement with the prior owner several years earlier. The plaintiff states the prior owner failed to execute the deed to the plaintiff at the completion of the terms of the agreement and now seeks a recordable deed to the property, free and clear of the lenderā€™s lien. The plaintiff also argues it timely satisfied all obligations under the contract for deed agreement before the seller sold the property to another and the lenderā€™s lien attached to the property; and thus, alleges that the subsequent transaction is clouding the plaintiffā€™s title and is void.  There may be various legal and equitable defenses for the lender in such a lawsuit, but the time and expense incurred may be significant.

Practical Pointers

Before closing on a home, there may be ways to uncover and address a contract for deed agreement before the issue culminates into contentious litigation for new buyers and lenders. Here are some steps to consider:

• If the seller asserts there is a tenant occupying the property, ask if there is or has been any contract for deed agreements (a/k/a installment purchase/sale land contract) with the tenant or any other party.
• If there is a contract for deed and the intended purchaser has defaulted or violated the agreement, request written documentation identifying that the contract for deed agreement is cancelled. In certain cases, this may require legal action by the seller to establish that the equitable interest is extinguished. It is recommended that this documentation be recorded.
• If the terms of a contract for deed are still in effect, however, the seller and the intended purchaser mutually agree to terminate the contract, it is recommended that a written termination of the contract for deed agreement between the parties be obtained and recorded.
• Last, if the intended purchaser under the contract for deed is unwilling to release their equitable interest or asserts that the legal titleholder has violated the agreement, then contact the anticipated title underwriter and the proposed lender prior to the closing date to discuss what options may be available for the situation.

A contract for deed remains a resource to help some with the home buying process. However, the impact of such an agreement can later result in a challenge to the title and impact others when a dispute arises between the parties in the agreement. If you have questions, reach out to me or any member of the °µĶų³Ō¹Ļ claims team.

Resources:

• Myslajek, C. (January 1, 2009). ĢżRisks and realities of the contract for deed.Ģż.
• Texas Property Code, Title 2 ā€“ Conveyances, Chapter 5 ā€“ Conveyances, Subchapter D. Executory Contract for Conveyance.Ģż
• The Office of Minnesota Attorney General.ĢżContract for Deed.Ģż
• Vockrodt, S. and Ziegler, L. (March 2, 2022).ĢżContract for deed: The promise of homeownership that often leaves Midwest buyers out in the cold.Ģż

This blog contains general information only, not intended to be relied upon as, nor a substitute for, specific professional advice. We accept no responsibility for loss occasioned to any purpose acting on or refraining from action as a result of any material on this blog.

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The best, most effective strategies for acquiring and maintaining new business do not depend upon the delivery of pastries or a free lunch. Today, gaining business means searching for and then filling needs, recognizing gaps, appealing to goals, and ultimately providing tools for achieving those goals.

A defined process that leads to a better understanding of a prospectā€™s pain points, coupled with a plan of attack, enables a title agent to bring value to clients.

Weā€™ve all been there. After weeks, perhaps months, of professionally approaching a real estate agent or lender prospect, the much-sought-after initial meeting gets scheduled. 

Our thoughts turn toward how best to provide value to the prospect, within the bounds of compliance, that will sufficiently attract them to begin using our services.

Too often, however, our approach centers around providing the laundry list of goods and services our company offers. We run through that list hoping that at some point our prospect will react favorably and drill down into the particular offer they find irresistible.

In reality, this approach almost never works. What we have unwittingly done is wasted the prospectā€™s time by offering products or services that are not needed. The meeting ends with a polite ā€œthank you,ā€ and ā€œwe will let you know.ā€

There is a better approach, and it involves putting ourselves in the place of our potential referral source so we can view their business challenges through their eyes. It is a given that they are faced with the same type of struggles we face when trying to obtain business. They are seeking ways to attract their own referral sources, and they are spending time and money to do so.

Instead of laying our tools on the table hoping one will be useful to our prospect, the better approach would be a consultative one. Use the first five minutes of the meeting asking questions about business strategy and goals, methods currently being employed, and the history of success and failure.

When we listen, we can detect areas in which to offer help and provide tools.

For real estate agent prospects, this may involve keying-in on monthly meetings put on by the broker in charge. It is their obligation to provide meetings and speakers to bring value to their franchise, and to attract and keep top agents. 

An offer to sponsor the food, as well as line up industry speakers, will go a long way toward obtaining an endorsement from the broker, while earning valuable face time with the agents with whom we are trying to connect. Providing a short segment on title insurance itself will show your prospects that you are a subject-matter expert and worthy of their consideration.

For lender prospects, offer to line up a real estate office presentation, with them as the main speaker, on lending topics of interest to agents. Again, offering to help with the food, line up the presentation, and participate in the program will bring value to your relationship with that lender. It is possible to work collaboratively with your prospects, employing a consultative approach and filling needs and gaps to help them in their business. This places you and your agency top-of-mind when the decision is made for title work.

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