My transactional attorney told me this week that on any deal above 1.2M he reads the title commitment before I do now
Got a 1.4M estate in Scottsdale under contract in November, seller was a trust with four beneficiaries spread across three states, and I had the assignment clause, the buyer lined up, the earnest money posted. Title commitment came back with a 2003 lien from a contractor the trust had never discharged, 61 thousand dollars, and one of the beneficiaries had a judgment against her personally that the title company flagged as potentially attaching to her interest. My buyer's attorney read that and called me, not my buyer, me, and asked how I planned to cure it. I did not have a good answer. We lost 19 days working through it and the buyer walked on day 22. I ended up reassigning to a second buyer at 38k less than the original fee because by then the seller was nervous and I needed to close before the trust voted to pull the listing entirely. My attorney said if he had read that commitment the day it landed instead of three days later when I forwarded it, we catch the judgment issue before my first buyer's attorney does and we control the conversation. He was right and I have no good argument against it. The lien got paid from proceeds, the judgment question got a title insurance endorsement, and we closed at 1.4 with a 74k fee instead of 112. I left 38k on the table because of a 72-hour information gap.
