Title Insurance Expert Witnesses
Title insurance underpins nearly every real estate transaction, so disputes over title defects, closing practices, and claims handling can carry substantial consequences for lenders, developers, investors, and the insurers and agents who serve them. Insured lenders and owners contest coverage denials and the scope of exceptions for easements, encroachments, liens, and access, while title underwriters pursue their issuing agents over escrow defalcations, improper closings, and failures to follow underwriting guidelines. Commercial parties also litigate over title commitments, endorsements, and the handling of construction escrows, and regulators and private plaintiffs raise claims involving settlement practices and affiliated business arrangements. In each case, the central question is whether title examination, underwriting, closing, and claims practices conformed to the standards that govern the industry.
A title insurance expert evaluates that question by reconstructing how a title was searched, insured, closed, and handled after a claim arose. The expert can review title commitments, policies, endorsements, search records, and closing files to determine whether exceptions were properly raised, whether coverage applies to the defect at issue, and whether an agent complied with its agency agreement and underwriting instructions. In escrow and settlement disputes, the analysis may address disbursement controls, good funds requirements, and compliance with RESPA and related regulations. These findings help counsel establish or rebut coverage, indemnity, and negligence claims, allocate losses among underwriters, agents, and lenders, and quantify damages tied to diminished property value or the cost of curing title.
Title insurance disputes call for experts who have worked inside the industry's underwriting, agency, and claims functions rather than viewing it from the outside. Round Table Group's title insurance experts include former underwriter executives and agency principals with decades of experience in claims, closing procedures, and the management of defalcation losses, real estate attorneys who have published on title law, leases, and easements, and actuaries experienced in title insurance rates and loss reserving. The network also includes specialists in commercial transactions, construction escrow, conservation easements, and RESPA compliance, including one who testified before a U.S. House Financial Services subcommittee on title insurance issues. Drawing on more than 75,000 expert searches for litigators, we can help you identify the right title insurance expert by calling us at (202) 908-4500.
