Posted by I.R. on July 09, 2003 at 23:56:45:
It’s time for you to hire a lawyer to put some heat on the title company/insurer.
If the lien went on after the date of the issue of your title policy, there’s an excellent chance that the title co. erred & missed the lien & now owe you money for their screwup.
Your lawyer will demand a copy of the title policy if you can’t find yours. If you ever even got one. Did you?
Some general insurance law, by the way. Language of the title policy itself, not just some “certificate” that purports to explain the policy, governs & controls & sets out the duties & rights of you & the title co. So the first thing your lawyer will do is obtain a true copy of the policy to learn what it says & whether it does indeed, contain such an exculpatory clause excusing the title ins. co from their error.
It’s a frequent occurrence that the certificate of coverage will NOT be the same as the policy itself, and the latter is the ONLY one to be considered, so it must be found & checked.
A truism in the legal world is that of all the different kinds of insurance companies, the most gutless, in terms of being unwilling to do hard fought courtroom warfare, is the title ins. co. They’re quite often unwilling, for a lot of reasons, to go to war & spend anything in defense, unlike the typical casualty company, so will make an effort to settle & pay without a courtroom battle.
Probably makes them more money NOT being seen as the courtroom bully and Mr. Bad Guy, as they don’t want to build the image of NOT paying.
You & I don’t really care whether our auto insurance pays the other guy, but we care a LOT about what our insurance co. pays us!
So if we know they’ve won, and remember their name, next time we need title insurance, we might NOT buy from them!