Title Insurance: The Part of Buying a Home Nobody Talks About
Buying a Home · From Moving Fort Wayne
Title Insurance: The Part of Buying a Home Nobody Talks About
Everyone wants to talk about the kitchen. The backyard. The square footage and the schools and whether the primary bedroom gets good morning light. But there's a quieter part of every home sale, one you can't walk through or photograph, that determines whether the whole thing actually goes through. It's title insurance. And as Brad Noll learned across two decades in Fort Wayne real estate, it's often the difference between a smooth closing and a deal that falls apart at the last possible second.
On this episode of Moving Fort Wayne, Brad sat down with Katelyn High, Account Manager at Meridian Title, to pull back the curtain on the part of the process most buyers and sellers never see coming. What they covered is the kind of thing that sounds boring right up until it saves you tens of thousands of dollars.
What Title Insurance Actually Is
Let's start with the basics, because most people genuinely don't know. As Katelyn explained, title insurance is a one-time fee a buyer pays that protects them for as long as they own the property. It ensures you own your home fully and with clear title.
What does "clear title" mean in practice? It means no surprises attached to the property you just bought. A seller might still have a mortgage tied to the home. There could be judgments, liens, or unpaid taxes. The property might have a history involving a divorce, a bankruptcy, or even a tax sale.
"So we do a full search of the property," Katelyn said. "When you are buying a piece of property, you can fully own it with confidence."
Brad framed it with one of his favorite truths about insurance of any kind: "You can't buy it when you need it. You actually have to buy it ahead of time." That's the whole point. Title insurance is protection you put in place before a problem ever surfaces, not after.
When the Numbers Don't Add Up
Brad shared a story from about 20 years ago that shows exactly why this matters. He sold a home for roughly $160,000, and the owners believed they owed around $120,000. The team ran the net sheet, helped the sellers figure out what they'd walk away with, and everyone felt good about it. Then, right before closing, a second lien surfaced on the property. The sellers thought they were getting a nice check. Instead, they got a hard conversation.
It happens more than you'd think. People use their homes like an ATM, Brad noted, taking out equity lines for renovations, emergencies, vacations, or a new car. Each of those can quietly attach to the title.
Katelyn confirmed it's a regular occurrence: "Some people have denied even having a second mortgage, and that has held up closing."
She also walked through a wrinkle most people never consider. A judgment or lien that's still pending, not yet approved, doesn't have to be paid at closing. But if it gets approved the day before you close, it has to be included on the settlement statement and the proceeds taken out. Timing, in other words, is everything.
Can Crazy Cousin Eddie Come Back for His Cut?
Brad asked the question a lot of buyers secretly worry about. What if, five years down the road, a relative or an ex-spouse claims they were a part owner and never got paid?
Katelyn's answer was reassuring and grounded in process. The title search pulls up everyone legally tied to the property. If someone isn't on record and has no documentation proving ownership, it becomes a "he said, she said" with no legal standing. Everything runs on paper: deeds, divorce decrees, trusts, transfer-on-death records. "We look at all of that to make sure that we're dividing the proceeds and going about the paperwork as we should."
So no, as Brad put it, "somebody's crazy cousin Eddie just can't come back" and demand a payout. There has to be documentation.
Fraud Is Everywhere
One of the most sobering parts of the conversation was about fraud, which Katelyn described in two words: "It's everywhere." Meridian has an entire team dedicated to catching it, led by a specialist who has worked there since she was 17 and is now 65.
The threats are often microscopic. "It could be just the finest tooth detail that could be off," Katelyn said, citing something as small as an O standing in for a zero on a driver's license. That's why her team asks so many questions and moves through such a tedious verification process, so that everyone at the closing table is confident each person is exactly who they claim to be.
Brad added a warning every buyer should hear: be extremely careful with wiring instructions. Scammers send convincing emails about down payments and wire transfers. If something looks even slightly off, stop and verify. It's another reason to loop in your title company early.
How Sellers Can Get Ahead of Problems
Katelyn's best advice for sellers? Open a preliminary title search before you list. With Meridian, it's free, and it reviews the full history of your property up front.
"It's going to expose those," she said of hidden second mortgages, liens, and judgments, "so we know how to act." It also surfaces sensitive details a seller might be hesitant to mention to a brand-new agent, like a past bankruptcy or whether an ex-spouse is still tied to the title. Knowing early means no scramble later, and the ability to move fast if a cash buyer wants a quick close.
Closings: The Last Piece of the Puzzle
Katelyn lit up talking about closings, "because it's a big deal. We're the last piece of the puzzle." She loves the side-by-side sit-downs where buyers and sellers swap stories about the neighbors and the memories made in the home.
She also shared an unforgettable one. A seller, a young mom moving to Carmel to be near family, broke down mid-signature. It took 45 minutes of comfort, eventually finishing the paperwork in her car, with the message that "your family is your home. It's not the house that you have."
On the practical side, expect a buyer with a mortgage to sign well over a hundred documents and budget 30 to 40 minutes. Sellers usually finish in 10 to 20.
The Throughline: Confidence
Brad and Katelyn kept circling back to one word: confidence. As Katelyn said, "It's okay not to know everything. There's no such thing as a dumb question."
That's the heart of how The Noll Team works, surrounding clients with the best partners so every decision feels informed instead of overwhelming. "Confidence leads to better decision making," Brad said, "and better decision making means you get to keep more money in your pocket."
#MovingFortWayne #FortWayneRealEstate #HomeBuying #RealEstateTips #TheNollTeam #HomeMaintenanceTips #SpringHomeCare #MidwestHomes #HomeInspection #HomeOwnership
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Titlework Tea with Katelyn High from Meridian Title, on Moving Fort Wayne.
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