Home buyers, mortgage lenders, and real estate agents often remain in continuous contact with one another throughout the course of a real estate transaction. And, at some point during the process, the title insurance company also gets involved, performing a multitude of tasks required for closing services, not the least of which is a title search.
Title companies can also issue lender’s title insurance, collect and hold money for escrow accounts, and even perform closing services for the home buyer and the owner of the property. In fact, the title insurance company has a lot more to do when someone wants to buy a home than you might think, and all of these tasks are not without their challenges.
And, quite often, dealing with some of those challenges can cause closing services to be delayed. According to Realtor Magazine, issues relating to the title insurance company accounts for 11% of delays or problems during a real estate transaction. While titling and deed issues isn’t the largest cause of delays, it’s still a pretty significant number.
Title professionals are well aware of this fact and are striving to find ways to improve efficiency, remain consistently productive, and subsequently grow their business without taking on more than they can handle at one time.
To that end, there are three key challenges facing title companies today:
- Not enough time to efficiently complete daily tasks and responsibilities
- Juggling too many tasks
- Generating new business in a competitive market
These struggles make a lot of sense when you consider that nearly 70% of title professionals are responsible for up to 25 closings a month. The amount of work involved in each closing is time-consuming, tedious, and needs to be performed in a well-organized and capable manner. Instead, many title professionals find themselves rushing to try and complete their work.
Not Enough Time to Complete Work
Title professionals who took part in a survey stated that they simply don’t have enough time to properly devote to all their tasks required for each closing. They also stated difficulty in attempting to maintain steady communication with real estate agents, buyers, and so as not to slow or impede productivity.
Too Many Responsibilities
Title professionals also stated that the main one of the main reasons they feel rushed and don’t have enough time is that they simply have too many different tasks to juggle for each closing. Adding to this burden is the fact that 9 out of 10 title professionals surveyed stated that they also had to clean up errors or complete work that had been neglected by prior title professionals or closers. This just results in poorer performance all around, creating more stress and frustration in an already overburdened industry.
“Clearly, when title professionals are strapped for time already, having to fix something that could have been avoided is a major point of frustration,” the survey said. “Perhaps the lack of time is exactly why title issues aren’t always discovered or properly handled when they should be. This feeds into a common cycle of rushing to close a file, cleaning up a closed file, back to rushing to close a file.”
Difficulties Growing the Business
Of course, title professionals wish to grow their business, but are having increased difficulty doing so without time to market themselves properly, nor the capability to adequately to handle more incoming work. In the survey, more than half of the CEOs or VPs of title companies that responded also said that they are personally handling up to 5 closings per month on their own, when this time could be better spend acquiring new business and other important tasks.
Using an ACH Transfer System to Aid in Collecting Escrow Payments
While some parts of the closing services performed by title insurance company can’t and shouldn’t be rushed, there are other aspects that can be facilitated by advancing technology. For example, collecting closing costs, money for escrow accounts, and other related payments can be performed easily and quickly when using an ACH electronic money transfer system.
Paymints.io is a specially designed ACH transfer system that works as an ideal solution for the real estate industry. The payment platform utilizes and easy-to-use app that allows real estate professionals to send requests for payments directly to a user’s mobile device, by which they can then quickly and easily send the requested money without even having to leave their home to go to the bank.
This saves a significant amount of time and allows the mortgage lenders, real estate agents, and other parties involved in a real estate transaction to keep the process flowing smoothly without being hindered by unnecessary delays.
While saving time is, of course, of great benefit, perhaps even more important is the advanced security protocols built into paymints.io. Bank-level encryption, real-time tracking, and ID protection serve to greatly reduce the risk of fraud, a problem that persists with wire transfers and cashier’s checks in the real estate industry.
Title companies can begin using new technologies such as this and others to streamline their workflow and better manage their daily tasks, allowing for more free time to either handle additional responsibilities or market their business to potential new clients. With technology now being a driving force in the way many companies do business and adapt to changes in the marketplace, it only makes sense for title companies to harness the power of new applications, systems, and other advances in order to improve upon all aspects of the business.
From using virtual assistants to contact real estate agents, home buyers, and other parties in a real estate transaction, as well as to relay messages, set up appointments, and other communicative tasks is also a great way to improve time-management on a daily basis. It’s also a great way to improve customer service, a necessary component of growing a business. Technology can further aid in this endeavor as well, enabling title companies to better market to and reach prospective clients.
Keep up to date with the latest industry news and other informative topics about the current and future real estate market by visiting various online forums and blogs that offer useful information and resources.
To learn more about how using paymints.io can be safer and more secure than a wire transfer, as well as especially convenient for both you and the home buyer, schedule a free demo today!
