A Title Issue Came Up Before Closing. Who Fixes It, and by When?

Ask for the full title commitment and read Schedule B. Part I lists Requirements: things somebody must produce, sign or record before the policy can issue, and those are the curable ones. Part II lists Exceptions: what the policy will not cover, which stays unless the company agrees to remove it. Which part lists your item tells you whether this is paperwork or a decision.

I'm Jeff Moran, a mortgage broker in Bluffton, South Carolina, originating since 1996, NMLS #483943, through C2 Financial Corporation, licensed in fifteen states. The message that starts this is almost always the same shape. Two weeks out, an email from the closing office says there is "an issue with title" and someone is "working on it." No document is attached. Nobody says who is doing what, or by when, and the client is left to guess whether they are about to lose the home.

The guessing is unnecessary. A document exists that says exactly what is wrong, and you can ask for it.

What is a title commitment, and why does Schedule B decide everything?

A title commitment is the title company's written promise to insure the property, listed with everything standing between today and that promise.

It comes in parts, and the parts are the point. Schedule A says what is insured, who holds the estate, and how much coverage is proposed. Schedule B splits in two. Part I holds the Requirements — the specific acts that must happen before a policy issues. Part II holds the Exceptions — the matters the finished policy will simply not cover.

That split does something a vague email cannot. A Requirement is a to-do item with an owner. An Exception is a permanent fact about the property that you either accept or negotiate around. Reading one as the other is how a curable two-week item gets treated as a catastrophe, and how a permanent restriction gets waved through as "they're clearing it."

The commitment also has a clock in it that almost nobody mentions. Under the ALTA Commitment for Title Insurance form used across the industry, if the Schedule B, Part I Requirements are not met within six months after the Commitment Date, the commitment terminates and the company's liability under it ends. The forms are revised periodically, so read the version attached to your own file rather than a description of it. But the shape of the rule is worth carrying: the promise to insure is not open-ended.

So there are two things to ask for in writing: the complete commitment rather than a summary email, and the number of the item that is causing the delay. A closing office that will not produce the numbered item is telling you something about the file.

Is my item a Requirement or an Exception?

Here is how the items that actually show up sort themselves.

What turns up	Where it is	Who normally clears it	Typical effect on the closing date
An existing mortgage that must be paid off and satisfied	Part I Requirement	The seller's closing agent, out of sale proceeds	None, as long as the payoff figure arrives on time
A judgment or unreleased contractor's lien against the seller	Part I Requirement	The seller, by payment, release or a bond	Days to weeks, depending on who holds it
A name that does not match the chain after a marriage, divorce or death	Part I Requirement	The seller, with a corrective deed, affidavit, decree or death certificate	Usually days
An unresolved interest of a prior owner or an heir	Part I if curable, Part II if not	An attorney, sometimes a court	Weeks, occasionally much longer
Recorded easements, restrictive covenants, an HOA declaration	Part II Exception	Nobody — they stay on the property	None, but read them before closing
Rights of parties in possession and matters a survey would show	Part II Exception, often removable	A current survey plus an affidavit from the seller	Days, if a survey is ordered early

The one to slow down on is row four. An old interest that was never released is the item behind most of the frightening emails, and the honest answer is that it depends on the record: sometimes an affidavit and a quitclaim from a cooperative relative closes it in a week, and sometimes it needs a court action to settle who owns what, which nothing makes fast.

Worth saying plainly: whether a specific defect is curable, and how, is a legal question about that state's real property law. The person to answer it is the closing attorney or title company handling your file. I price and re-sequence the loan around their answer. I do not supply it.

Who has to produce the missing document, and who pays for it?

Almost always the seller, and almost always the seller.

The seller's obligation in a standard purchase contract is to convey title in an insurable condition. Curative work on the seller's side of the chain — an old lien, a missing satisfaction, a signature problem from a prior transfer — is therefore the seller's job and the seller's cost, paid out of proceeds at closing. Which is why a seller with thin equity may genuinely be unable to clear a large lien, and why that is worth knowing early.

The buyer pays for coverage, not for curing. The lender's policy is required on every financed purchase because it protects the lien; the owner's policy is the separate one protecting the buyer's own equity against a defect that surfaces later, and on a file where title already produced a surprise, declining it is a strange bet. Who actually pays for the owner's policy is less settled than the internet claims.

One cost quietly lands on the buyer anyway: the survey. When the fix for a Part II exception is a current survey, somebody orders it and somebody pays, and in a contract silent on the point it is frequently the party who needs it. It is a small number against a delay, and cheaper the week it is identified than the week of closing. The wider map of who pays for what at the table is in the closing-cost breakdown.

Why does a lien with a deadline sometimes clear itself?

Because liens have statutory lives, and some of them expire.

A contractor's lien is the common example, and the deadlines are state law rather than custom. South Carolina is a useful case, and it is my own state. Under South Carolina Code Title 29, Chapter 5, section 29-5-90 dissolves a mechanics' lien unless the claimant serves the owner and files a sworn statement of account within ninety days after last furnishing labor or materials. Section 29-5-120 then dissolves it unless suit is commenced and a notice of pendency filed within six months of that same date.

Read as a client rather than as a lawyer, that means something useful: a recorded lien already past its statutory window may be clearable by affidavit rather than by payment, so the date on the filing matters as much as the amount. Statutes get amended, the deadlines differ by state, and only the closing attorney can apply them to your file. Knowing the question exists is what gets it asked.

What does a title cure do to my loan dates?

It moves three things, and each one has a cost.

The rate lock. A lock is a commitment for a stated number of days. When a Requirement lands with an uncertain cure, the cheapest-looking lock is frequently the wrong one, because an extension bought under pressure costs more than the longer lock did at the start. Price the lock that reaches past the estimate, not the one that reaches the old closing date. What happens to a lock when the market moves under it is worth understanding before you need to ask.

The financing contingency. It expires on the date the contract set, and that date has no relationship to the title company's schedule. This is the trap: the buyer's protection can run out while everyone waits on a document nobody controls, and extending it is a written amendment, not an understanding. How the financing contingency and the earnest money interact is the same here as on any file, which is why it needs watching on this one.

The final approval. Clear to close is not the end of the file. Title conditions are typically the last ones released, and a cure landing the day before closing still has to be reviewed and the figures redrawn. What clear to close actually means, and what can still move after it, is the difference between a calm week and a frantic one.

Under all three is one calendar carrying both sets of dates, the contract's and the cure's, written in the same place. The conflicts are visible weeks before they are urgent, and almost never visible in an inbox. The ordinary contract-to-closing sequence is the baseline; the cure gets laid over it.

What are the common mistakes when a title issue turns up?

Accepting a verbal summary. "There's a title issue" is not information. The numbered item is.

Assuming a delay means a dead file. Most Requirements are administrative. A missing satisfaction on a mortgage paid off long ago is the most common one, and it is a records problem, not an ownership problem.

Letting the contingency lapse while being reasonable. Being patient about a cure and extending the contingency in writing are two different acts. Do both.

Waiting to re-price the lock. The cure is the seller's to run. The lock is yours, and it moves whether or not anyone updates you.

Treating an Exception as a negotiation. A recorded easement is not going away because the closing is Friday. What can move is the price, the timing, or the decision to proceed.

An illustration

Numbers below are made up to show the mechanism. No real client, no real file.

A buyer is eleven days from closing on a resale. The commitment comes back with one item on Schedule B, Part I: a home equity line recorded against the property in 2014, with no satisfaction of record. The seller says it was paid off and closed at their refinance. Nobody can find the release.

Read as a Requirement, this is a records problem with a known shape. The seller's closing agent orders a payoff statement from the servicer, which either shows a zero balance and produces a release or shows a balance that comes out of proceeds. The variable is the servicer's turnaround, not the seller's good faith.

So the calendar carries both sets of dates:

Contract closing date            day 11
Financing contingency expires    day 6
Rate lock expires                day 14
Release requested from servicer  day 1
Servicer's stated turnaround     10 to 15 business days

Laid out like that, the decision is obvious on day one rather than day nine. The contingency gets extended in writing this week, not next. The lock is short against a fifteen-business-day outside estimate, so it gets priced out now while an extension is still cheap. The closing date moves by agreement rather than by emergency.

None of that requires a lawyer, an argument, or a lost night. It requires the document, and one page with both sets of dates on it.

Common questions

What is a title commitment and how do I get a copy?

A title commitment is the title company's written promise to issue a policy on the property, subject to the Requirements and Exceptions listed in Schedule B. It is produced during the contract period, usually within the first two weeks. Ask the closing attorney or title company handling the file for the complete document, Schedule A plus both parts of Schedule B. It is routinely provided on request, and your own copy is the difference between reading the actual item and relying on a summary of it.

What is the difference between a Schedule B Part I Requirement and a Part II Exception?

A Requirement is something that must be done before the policy can issue: a lien released, a document signed, a payoff made, an affidavit produced. Requirements are the curable items, and each has somebody responsible for it. An Exception is a matter the policy will not cover, such as a recorded easement or a restrictive covenant. Exceptions generally stay with the property, though some, including standard survey exceptions, can be removed when the title company receives the right documentation.

Can a property still close if there is a lien on it?

Frequently, yes. A lien paid from the seller's sale proceeds is ordinary and gets handled at the closing table every day, which is exactly what happens with the seller's existing mortgage on essentially every resale. What matters is whether the lien is payable, whether the proceeds cover it, and whether the holder will issue a release. A lien larger than the seller's equity is the case that genuinely stalls.

Who pays to fix a title problem, the buyer or the seller?

Curative work on the seller's side of the chain is normally the seller's responsibility and comes out of their proceeds, because a standard purchase contract obligates the seller to convey insurable title. The buyer pays for coverage rather than for curing: the lender's policy is required on a financed purchase, and the owner's policy is the separate one protecting the buyer's own interest. A survey ordered to remove an exception frequently lands on whichever party needs it, so read what the contract says.

How long does it take to clear a title issue before closing?

It depends entirely on the item. A missing satisfaction on a paid-off mortgage moves at the servicer's pace, often two to three weeks. A corrective deed or an affidavit fixing a name mismatch can be done in days. An unresolved interest belonging to a prior owner or an heir can take weeks, and months if it needs a court proceeding. The question to ask is not "when will it be fixed" but "what has been requested, from whom, and what is their stated turnaround."

Should I extend my financing contingency while title is being cleared?

That is a contract decision for you, your agent and, where one is involved, your attorney, and it is the question most likely to be missed while everyone watches the cure. The financing contingency expires on the date the contract set, regardless of what title is doing, and an extension is a written amendment rather than an understanding between parties. Raising it early costs nothing. Raising it late is how a buyer ends up choosing between an unprotected closing and walking away from earnest money.