Building a Title Plant

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Building a Title Plant

• Doug Bello
• D. Bello Associates, Inc.
• Pasadena, California

2004 halFILE User Group Austin, Texas
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Introduction
Building a Title Plant

• Theres no road map to follow
• Theres no right way to do this
• You will only do this once, no second chances!

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What to expect
Building a Title Plant

• This is a big time commitment
• Dont think this will be easy

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Before you begin
Building a Title Plant

• Talk to other title companies they are a great
  resource for dos and don'ts
• Talk to someone at hal Systems theyve been
  through a few of these over the years
• Appoint a project manager, give someone this
  responsibility.

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Set-up Checklist
Building a Title Plant

• Obtain all source documents
• Plat edits
• Establish all keying/posting rules and put them
  in writing
• Locating/arbing procedures

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Establishing Keying Rules
Building a Title Plant

• Understand necessities vs. luxuries Everything
  you key costs
• Understand the purpose of what you are keying
  Will you be searching from the title chain or
  looking at each document?
• Dont go crazy in the portion of legal or the
  remarks field

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County Name Indexes
Building a Title Plant

• Can you obtain an outside source of
  grantor/grantee names?
• Do you agree with the parties that are picked up
  from the documents?
• Is it consistent and reliable?
• Always have a back-up plan

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Dealing with Locates
Building a Title Plant

• What is a locate?
• Count on 10-12 of all recorded documents to be
  located
• How do deal with locates in a backplant vs. daily
  keying

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Testing Quality Assurance
Building a Title Plant

• Always complete a sample keying test
• Continue testing until you get satisfactory
  results
• Quality check work on a regular basis
• Never assume that a good sample will continue
  forever things change
• What is an acceptable error rate?

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Ensuring Quality
Building a Title Plant

• Single pass vs. double pass
• Sight verification vs. key verification
• How does key verification work
• Plat edits verifying lots and blocks as well as
  valid Sections, Townships and Ranges

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Outsourcing Is it for me?
Building a Title Plant
Cons
Pros

• No in-house staff training, no hiring, no firing
• No overtime when recordings soar
• Lower plant maintenance costs

• Start-up is a lot of work
• Less control over personnel
• Continued QA will be your responsibility

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Outsourcing Selecting a Vendor
Building a Title Plant

• Obtain and contact multiple references
• Ask specific questions How would you..?
• If they dont know what sectional property is,
  you are probably talking to the wrong vendor
• Do they understand title?
• Do they have other capabilities such as to search
  or arb?

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Protecting your Data
Building a Title Plant

• Back up your plant and images
• Use at least one off-site source of data storage
• Be sure to back up plat edits, PIN lists, and any
  other tables or data
• Hard copy data should be filmed or scanned
  directly into halFILE

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Building a Title Plant
Success and Failure stories
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Famous Last Words
Building a Title Plant

• I wish I had talked to someone who had done this
  before.
• I didnt know how hard this was going to be.
• I didnt budget enough time.
• I didnt understand how the title searching
  software worked with what I had keyed.
• I wish I had understood this from the start.

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Building a Title Plant
Questions Discussion