Title Insurance: What You Need to Be Protected

Title insurance is important coverage to consider when you purchase or inherit any real estate in Florida.

Florida law is clear that claims against an estate are barred (prohibited) two years after the date of death. Florida law is also clear that, with limited exceptions, one cannot directly sue the insurance company of another. You must sue that person (such as the person who carelessly wrecked your car) in order to get at their insurance. So does that mean that the owner’s old title insurance policy on the property won’t protect you as the beneficiary of a trust or estate?

Maybe. It probably means that the beneficiary of a Trust is not covered, which means there could be a major problem for beneficiaries if they don’t purchase their own title insurance policy. However, under some companies’ policies, the beneficiary of an estate is covered by the original policy. The safe thing to do is to read the fine print of the policy. A title insurance policy premium is paid only once, at issuance, but it lasts (assuming the insurance company stays solvent) for as long as the owner lives, and for up to two years thereafter.

Title problems can occur even in the best of real estate deals, and some do not surface for a long, long time. Our Florida attorneys recommend buying title insurance whenever you acquire real estate in Florida, by purchase or from a trust, and you may even need it when you inherit the property so that you have the peace of mind knowing you have insurance to cure title problems that may surface many years from now.