Century Title Closing & Escrow LLC

Gay Sells, closing agent for Century Title at 325 Belcher Rd., Clearwater, handled title insurance and the closing of the condominium unit that we just bought. Sells made 9 egregious errors in handling the closing. Her errors exposed us to financial and legal liability, caused her to make false charges about Florida law, caused her to demand that we adhere to her erroneous understanding of Florida law, caused us to spend extra money to pay our lawyer, because she refused to correct these errors (until the lawyer forced her to do so), and caused us to waste many hours to correct her errors. Moreover, all of these errors by Gay Sells are clearly documented in written email exchanges (which we are happy to share with any potential buyers or sellers who document their need to see these written exchanges). Only those who want to lose money, to assume unnecessary legal and financial liability, to violate their purchase contracts, to pay more in attorney?s fees, and to waste inordinate time because of Century Title?s errors ? should ever do business with Gay Sells and Century Title. Sells? main errors are listed below. (1) Sells? ignorance of Florida real-estate law subjected us to possible loss of $170,000.00 and forced us to pay an attorney to correct her errors. Two days before the closing, Gay Sells of Century Title demanded that we, the buyers, deposit with her title company, through a wire transfer from our bank, more than $ 170,000.00, if we wanted the condo sale to close. When asked by us (the buyers) if our $ 170k would be returned, if (for some unexpected reason) there were no closing, by the required contract date, Sells response was legally incorrect and exposed us to great risk. She demanded that we send her the money ahead of time, and she wrote in two emails to us, that we would not get the $ 170,000.00 back (even if there were no closing by the required closing date), until and unless the sellers agreed to return our money. We pointed out that, (i) in the event of no closing by the contract date, there was no longer any valid contact for purchase of the condo, and (ii) in the event of no closing by the contract date, the sellers had no right to our $170,000.00. Otherwise, we pointed out to Sells, any seller could ?hold up? any buyer?s money, even if there were never a valid contract or any closing. Knowing that Sells was wrong about Florida law, for reasons (i) and (ii), we were forced to pay our lawyer to convince Sells that she was wrong about Florida law. She finally agreed she was wrong, but only after much stress to us, and after our having to pay an attorney to correct her error. (2) Sells? failure to consult her own attorney, her failure to follow our directions, and her failure to honor her promises to us, regarding her contacting our attorney and her releasing the name of our attorney, resulted in our having to pay our attorney extra, because she and the other realtors consulted him rather than their own attorney, when they needed clarifications of her errors regarding Florida law. We told Sells, both verbally and via email, that we were having our attorney examine the closing documents, before the closing, but that she was (a) neither to contact our attorney (b) nor to reveal his name to anyone, because we were paying him to protect our interests and to examine the closing documents for us. Sells promised us that she would follow both (a) and (b). We told Sells we were not paying our attorney to answer the questions of the title company or any of the realtors involved. In spite of Sells? explicitly promising us that she would follow (a) and (b), and that she would communicate with us, not our attorney, Sells violated both of these directions and promises to us. She contacted our attorney without our knowledge or permission, because she had questions about Florida law (see (1) above), because she needed to understand the contract provisions, to confer about the wiring instructions for the money, and to send the closing documents. We were not even copied on most of these email exchanges from Sells to our attorney. Sells also sent the name/address/phone of the attorney to the other realtors (the day after she promised us to keep his name secret, as we were paying him) ? and they too contacted our attorney for help. Sells appears either not to have her own attorney (whom she should be consulting for her questions), or not to want to pay her own attorney. As a result, she violated her promises to us, and she cost us extra money because of these violations. (3) Sells? unprofessional behavior caused her to formally violate the contract for purchase of the condo. This contract between the buyer and seller required Sells and Century Title to present written confirmation of title insurance commitment, no later than 5 days before the closing, yet Sells presented this commitment only 2 days before the closing, thus constituting a formal violation of the contract ? which could have voided the entire contract. (4) Because of contract violation (3) by Gay Sells of Century Title, we lost time and money and were greatly inconvenienced. We were forced to choose between either losing the condo we wished to purchase, or to give only a hurried look at the title-insurance commitment. As a result, we were forced to drop our own professional work, and thus miss their own professional deadlines, because of Sells? not following the contract, as documented in (3). (5) Because of contract violation (3) by Gay Sells of Century Title, the buyers were forced to pay their attorney extra, to look at the documents in only one day, when he should have had 5 days to examine them. (6) Every single written communication from Gay Sells (of Century Title) was unclear because she uses commas instead of periods, and one cannot distinguish separate sentences or what they are trying to say. As a consequence, both her contracts, deeds, privacy statements, and so on, are all unclear (7) On the day prior to the closing, Sells sent one set of documents to our attorney, claimed they were the final documents for the closing, then amended those documents, in 3 different ways, at the closing itself, when our attorney was not present. It makes no sense to pay an attorney to protect a person from an unscrupulous realtor or title company ? if the title company does not present the same documents to the attorney and at closing. Yet this is what Sells did. (8) The title insurance commitment -- that Sells routinely uses -- does not protect the purchaser of the property. Instead this policy (which we had to amend) claims that "The purchaser acknowledges that the lender's title insurance does not protect purchaser, and that purchaser is hereby purchasing owner's coverage or declining coverage at his own risk." There is no reason to have the owner purchase title insurance, to convey to the purchaser, if Sells is going to include such a provision in her contracts. (9) The privacy policy ? that Sells routinely uses ? does not protect the privacy of clients. Paragraph 5 of this privacy notice says that "We [Century Title] also may disclose this information [that Century Title collected] about our customers or former customers to our affiliates...with whom we have joint marketing agreements...providers such as companies engaged in banking, consumer finance, securities, and insurance." However, is there any good reason that people should permit Century title to sell information about them, to other companies who will mail them, engage in unwanted solicitation, and otherwise harass them, because of unwanted marketing? We believe that consumers should work with Century Title only at their own risk. Our realtor said she had never, in all her years of experience, seen such a mess as that created by this title company.