June 13, 2021, I celebrate ten years as a Company man. I’ve been a title insurance underwriter for Fidelity National Title Group now a decade. How quickly the time has passed. My two oldest children have graduated high school and one of them just finished college while the other is a sophomore (and together recently bought their first condo… with owner’s and loan title insurance!!). We adopted our two daughters from China during this time, moved twice, and I got another law degree. I even changed roles within FNTG going from Area Agency Underwriting Counsel over to the National Commercial Services side of the business. And now I’m staring down the age of 50 – yikes!!
Prior to joining the Company, I spent another ten years as a closing attorney and title insurance agent, following a few years before that in general practice. That adds up to now over 23 years lawyering and title stuff.
My journey in this business all started one Sunday morning at church when some friends approached me: “Hey, you’re a lawyer. Can you do our closing?” As a young attorney I was not accustomed to turning down business. Back then I only ate what I killed so I tried to take in everything I possibly could. My immediate response to them was “Absolutely!” The next morning, I shared with my non-lawyer co-worker what I had gotten us into. She quickly explained to me that she started working for the largest title company in town when she was 16 and that she would get us through this.[i] Indeed we did get through it, without today’s commonplace software and automation. And another closing followed… and another.
Well, that started something within me that has led to a great career I could never have imagined in the title insurance industry. After we had a few closings under our belt I remember thinking “I wouldn’t mind doing this full-time.” As business grew and we founded our agency with Chicago Title Insurance Company, that dream came true. In title I really found my professional joy. The struggles of a young lawyer with his own hanging shield are real. In title I found all the elements I was looking for: defined deliverables, consistency, measurable objectives, happy clients, growing a real business from the ground up, and getting paid at the table. What could be wrong with that picture? Title is not for everyone; but it sure has been the trick for me.
And we hit it at just the right time, too. 2001 – 2009 were some of the booming times in Tuscaloosa, Alabama to be in the title insurance business. The University of Alabama was on a growth trajectory and the national economy was growing as interest rates fell after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Real estate was the beneficiary of this, and the market was hot. While not a great salesman, I was blessed to take one younger friend to lunch after learning he had just become a Realtor®.[ii] That was another fortuitous relationship that bloomed into significant opportunities in our market. I basically wrote all the legal documents and closed (again and again) on almost every condo that sold in Tuscaloosa for a number of years. And there were a lot of them. If you don’t believe the title business is a relationship business, then you need to have your head examined. I didn’t need to know every real estate agent or banker, but the ones I did know were loyal and sent us a ton of business. Our little agency insured everything from single-family residence purchases with financing to full construction of major developments and commercial and industrial properties.
Life is a cycle. While the rest of the country succumbed earlier than us to economic woes, the bottom finally fell out locally as we rolled into 2010. I remember that first month we actually did not do a single closing. Fortunately, I had other legal matters producing income, but it started to concern me. Orders never came back quite as strong at Main Avenue Title Company, Inc. as the prior three years when we had finally earned the coveted Castle Club plaques from Chicago Title. That made us so proud as a fledgling agency to stand up there with the big guys at the annual meetings.
I started to consider if I should move back into more of a non-real estate focused law practice. But I had gotten to the point where title was “all I knew how to do” or “all I was good at” as I shared with a friend. One day my law partner suggested I reach out to our state office of Chicago Title to see if they might have some referrals or recommendations in the down market. As it turned out, the State Counsel job was opening up soon and they encouraged me to consider applying. What an unexpected smile that put on my face. After a few months of their interviewing more than 60 candidates they came back and offered me the job. As great an offer as it was, accepting it was still a struggle on a personal level. I had never worked for “the other fella” (as my always-self-employed grandparents used to call it). Although business was off, I assumed it would get better at some point; and there was no ceiling on income when you worked for yourself (but there certainly was a floor – like ZERO or below!) What about my plans for the future and bringing my sons into ownership? This was my “Fred Sanford” empire and I was proud of it! I was literally on the cusp of hiring a brand-new lawyer to raise up as my retirement / future buy-out plan. What about the clients and loyal title customers I had developed who were counting on me? And if I walked away from the agency I built, it would literally die along with all my sweat equity and financial investment. Those weren’t the days of willing buyers for title agencies like today. Lots to consider surely. After a lot of prayer and discussion with my wife[iii] and making our notorious pro/con lists, I ultimately took the role with the ALMA Agency office in Birmingham.
As a lawyer, I know everything (not!). How soon I came to realize what I had not experienced yet. While I had only called the state office a handful of times during my agency years, I found the complexity and variation in questions from great agents throughout Alabama, Mississippi, and Arkansas presented a lot of original issues for me. I confessed well into my time with ALMA that it took me a good three years to really get my sea legs and feel comfortable in my job. I never let that show because you learn quickly in law school to present with confidence (also instilled in me from Key Club days in high school!). Serving as underwriting counsel gave me great opportunities to learn so much about the assessment of risk from the Company perspective, what words in title insurance endorsements and policies really mean and how they are chosen, chances to teach new concepts or refresh old ones to fellow legal and title professionals across our 3-state footprint on a regular basis both in-person and online (before the pandemic made that a necessity), and to serve as a leader and advocate within the industry at the state and national level. I was particularly proud of starting Title PAC in Alabama along with a couple dozen founders, raising $60,000 in our first couple years. The opportunities as underwriting counsel also put me in a position to earn the National Title Professional™ designation from the American Land Title Association the first time in 2016 and later to be recognized as Advocate of the Year from the Title Action Network.
Completely happy in my position with agency support, I still had goals for professional advancement. I shared these with a senior underwriter in the Company; she told me to get more commercial experience. One day in the summer of 2018 I got a call out of nowhere from our Company’s National Commercial Services office in Atlanta asking if I would be interested in taking on the Managing Underwriting Counsel post. GEE WHIZ! Atlanta! No way, I thought. But I could not get it out of my head. This really matched up with a number of my goals in the Company. I remember talking through it at home and our making the pro/con list again. I woke up in the middle of the night during this process with an idea: if they could let me work in Atlanta Tuesday – Thursday I would only be away from home 2 nights a week (because we were not going to move, period). Could that work? When I pitched this to my prospective boss she explained that since Atlanta is such a trying commute for everyone most of the team already has the option to work from home one day a week. My 2 days #WFH could work as long as I was up for more in the office as circumstances warranted. The opportunity with the NCS was really good for me; and as much as I hated to leave the steadiness, known environment, and outstanding colleagues and agents of ALMA, I was excited for the chance to grow again in this industry I love. I had been driving about 130 miles round trip daily for over seven years to Birmingham and now I would drive about 450 miles roundtrip weekly to Atlanta, with a couple nights in between at my favorite, welcoming Extended Stay America near our office.
Focusing solely on large commercial deals in a direct, customer-facing office was a change for me as an underwriter. Unlike the previous learning curve, I honestly felt like I was stable after about six months. My initial transition had a couple quick, healthy servings of nutritious humble pie, but it made me much stronger. I’m continuing to learn new things all the time and experience a level of complexity to transactions and personalities like never before, but it is the thrill of a lifetime for me. And the last year has been almost like another career change in itself, with the shift to working from home all the time. I work with a terrific group of title professionals who support and encourage me in all my goals and how I like to do business. Exhibiting ownership and urgency are the hallmarks of what I preach in this Company to all who will listen. Our footprint is truly national; I get to interact with our Insureds, commercial real estate lawyers, and fellow underwriters across the country for significant, high-expectation transactions.
I’ll say it again: I could never have dreamed I would be where I am now. My initial days as a young lawyer were hard and desperate at times. God has blessed me with a life experience such that I feel now that “if it was any better I’d have to take something for it.” (But I’m willing…!) My guiding verse for work is Colossians 3:23-24 “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving.”
And 20 years is really just the beginning in this business. I can’t think about retirement for at least another 20; I have two more girls to raise and my wife really will retire soon!!
This is dedicated to the awesome people in the notes below:
[i] Stacy Perry, whose understanding and patience first made my title insurance career possible;
[ii] Andy Turner, whose outstanding book of business and trust first made my title business flourish;
[iii] my wife, Mikki Powell, without whom I wouldn’t want any of it.