Florida title insurance: the complete 2026 guide for buyers, sellers and Realtors

Loss from a problem with title. Florida law defines title insurance as insurance of owners of real property, and of lenders and others with an interest in it, "against loss by encumbrance, or defective titles, or invalidity, or adverse claim to title" (Fla. Stat. § 624.608(1)).

In practice that means things like these, which the standard owner's policy published by the American Land Title Association lists among its covered risks (ALTA Owner's Policy, 2021):

• title vested in someone other than the policy says;
• a defect, lien or encumbrance on the title, including forgery, fraud or a defective document in the chain, and unpaid taxes or assessments;
• unmarketable title;
• no right of access to and from the land;
• a lien or defect recorded between the policy date and the recording of the deed.

Title insurance looks backward. Most insurance covers what might happen next; this covers what had already happened by the date of the policy and was not found, or was found and not excepted. The same form excludes matters "attaching or created subsequent to the Date of Policy", with the narrow exceptions it states. That is why the work is done before the closing rather than after it: the search, the examination, and clearing what they find.

Every Florida policy is issued on a form the Office of Insurance Regulation has approved (§ 627.777(1)). The policy in front of you, with its own schedules, is what governs.

Who is protected. The owner's policy protects the buyer, and the rule requires it to be issued "for the full insurable value of the premises" (Fla. Admin. Code R. 69O-186.003(1)(a)2.) — in a sale, ordinarily the price. The lender's policy protects the lender, usually up to the loan amount, and nobody else.

That second point is the one Florida makes a rule about. The Financial Services Commission is required to adopt a form telling a buyer who borrows "that the purchaser-mortgagor is not protected by the title policy of the mortgagee" (Fla. Stat. § 627.798). A lender will require its own policy as a condition of the loan. Whether to have an owner's policy is the buyer's decision, and it is the only one of the two that protects the buyer.

Under the standard owner's form, coverage continues for as long as the insured keeps an interest in the land, and it reaches those who succeed to the title by operation of law rather than by purchase, such as heirs. It ends when the insured sells. A buyer from you needs a policy of their own.

What the rule says. Florida's Financial Services Commission adopts by rule "the premium to be charged in this state by title insurers" (Fla. Stat. § 627.782(1)), the rates "apply throughout this state" (§ 627.782(6)), and no one may knowingly quote, charge or collect a premium other than the one adopted, except as a separate provision allows (§ 627.780(1)). The rule is Fla. Admin. Code R. 69O-186.003.

The premium runs per $1,000 of coverage, in bands, with each band of the price charged at its own rate. A fraction of $100 counts as a full $100, and the minimum premium is $100.

On common purchase prices, the owner's policy comes to this:

The reissue column assumes the previous policy insured at least the new amount; above that, the rule charges the excess at the original rate. The title insurance calculator works out any price, with the lender's policy beside it.

When the seller's own title, or the borrower's on a refinance, was insured before, and both the agent and the underwriter keep a copy of that earlier owner's policy. The rule then applies the lower reissue schedule to three kinds of policy (R. 69O-186.003(2)(b)):

• a policy with an effective date less than 3 years after the policy that insured the seller or borrower — the common one;
• a policy on land that is unimproved except for roads, bridges, drainage and utilities, where the current owner's title was insured before;
• a lender's policy on a refinance of property whose owner's policy insured the current borrower.

Any new coverage above the amount of the earlier policy is charged at the original rate (R. 69O-186.003(2)(c)). On a $500,000 purchase that qualifies in full, the owner's policy is $1,530 rather than $2,575. It is worth asking about on every file, and the earlier policy is worth finding: the seller's closing papers from their own purchase usually include it.

Where an owner's and a lender's policy on the same land are issued together, the rule sets $25 as the minimum for the lender's policy up to the owner's amount, and charges any lender's coverage above that at the regular original rate (R. 69O-186.003(5)(a)). $25 is a floor, not a price: Bayit Title charges $125 to issue the lender's policy alongside the owner's, and that is the figure our estimate prints.

On a refinance there is no owner's policy alongside, so the lender's policy is priced on its own — at the reissue rate where the conditions above are met.

For the owner's policy, it is local custom, and it differs by county: in some the buyer customarily pays, in most the seller does, and in some it varies within the county. The purchase contract decides it on every sale, whatever the custom. The lender's policy is ordinarily on the borrower's side of the statement.

Who pays for title insurance in every Florida county has all 67 counties, on a map and in a table, with the table as a download. The premium is the same whichever side it lands on.

The premium is only the part the rule sets. The same rule requires at least actual cost to be charged for related title services on top of the premium, and requires the search, examination and closing charges to be shown separately on the closing statement (R. 69O-186.003(11)). Florida's definitions draw the same line: the premium pays for the underwriting work through the commitment and the policy, which does not include closing services or title searches, "for which a separate charge or separate charges may be made" (Fla. Stat. § 627.7711(1)(b)).

So a statement also carries charges no rule sets, which our estimate lists rather than guesses at:

• Our settlement or closing fee
• Title search and examination
• Endorsements the lender asks for
• Survey, municipal lien search, estoppel letters and association fees
• The lender’s own charges, prepaid interest, escrows and prorations

Beside them sit the taxes, which the Legislature sets and which have nothing to do with title insurance but are paid at the same table. On a $500,000 purchase with a $400,000 loan, outside Miami-Dade:

Miami-Dade charges the deed at 60¢ per $100, $3,000 on the same sale, plus a 45¢ surtax of $2,250 unless the property conveyed is only a single-family residence. The doc stamp calculator works each of these out for a specific sale, and the buyer and seller closing cost pages say which side each one usually falls on.

The commitment is the insurer's offer to issue the policy, and it is where the search shows its work. Florida does not allow one to be issued until the insurer has determined insurability from "the evaluation of a reasonable title search" and whatever else is needed, "in accordance with sound underwriting practices" (Fla. Stat. § 627.7845(1)).

On the ALTA commitment form it has three parts that matter to a reader (ALTA Commitment, 2021):

• Schedule A — the commitment date, the policy to be issued, the proposed insured and amount, who holds title now, and the legal description of the land. Check the names and the description first.
• Schedule B, Part I — Requirements. What has to happen before the policy issues: payoffs and releases, estoppel certificates, a spouse's joinder, a corrective deed, an affidavit. Each is a task with an owner, and this is the list a closing is cleared against.
• Schedule B, Part II — Exceptions. What the policy will not cover unless it is cleared: recorded easements and restrictions, the standard survey and possession exceptions, anything else the search found that is not being removed.

Read Part I as a to-do list and Part II as a list of what you are accepting. A problem found in the first week usually becomes a requirement with time to clear it; one found in the last week becomes a moved closing.

The standard owner's form excludes, among others (ALTA Owner's Policy, 2021):

• zoning, building and other land-use law, and governmental police power, except to the extent of a recorded enforcement notice the policy covers;
• eminent domain, with the same kind of carve-back;
• problems the insured created or agreed to, knew about and did not disclose, that cause no loss, or that arise after the policy date;
• property taxes that become due after the policy date;
• the quantity of area, square footage or acreage.

Beyond the exclusions sit the exceptions in Schedule B, Part II, and there Florida law narrows the standard ones. Where a certified survey was made within 90 days before the closing, the policy may except only the matters actually shown on it. Where the seller gives an affidavit that no one else is in possession, the policy may not except the rights of parties in possession not shown by the public records. And where the seller gives an affidavit that nothing furnished in the last 90 days is unpaid, it may not except unrecorded construction liens (Fla. Stat. § 627.7842(1)). Each of those can still be excepted where the insurer or agent knows facts that call for it and discloses them to the proposed insured.

An open permit is the case people most often assume is covered and is not: it is a municipal record, found by a municipal lien search rather than a title search, and the building-and-zoning exclusion sits over it. What happens if there's an open permit on the property before closing?

By statute, first. Money a Florida title agency receives in escrow is held "in a fiduciary capacity" and is "the property of the person or persons entitled thereto" (Fla. Stat. § 626.8473(2)). It must be placed immediately in an insured financial institution in Florida and kept there until disbursement is properly authorized (§ 626.8473(3)); it is not subject to the agency's debts and may be used only under the instructions it was accepted on (§ 626.8473(4)); and the agency keeps separate records of every receipt and disbursement (§ 626.8473(5)).

Behind the agency stands the insurer. A title insurer is liable for the defalcation, conversion or misappropriation, by a licensed agent or agency, of funds held in trust under that section (Fla. Stat. § 627.792). An insurer may also give a prospective insured an approved instrument — a closing protection letter — under which it takes on liability for its agent's fraud, dishonesty, misappropriation of funds, or failure to follow written closing instructions (§ 627.786(3)).

And where the insurer or its agent disburses the closing funds, the insurer insures against liens and defects recorded between the commitment date and the recording of the deed, except matters the insured knows about (§ 627.7841).

None of that stops a criminal emailing false wiring instructions. We never send wiring instructions by email and never email a change to instructions already given. Anyone who receives one should call us, on a number they already have, before sending anything.

In Florida, a person may not act as a title insurance agent until the Department of Financial Services has issued them a license (Fla. Stat. § 626.8417(1)), and a title agent is appointed in writing by the insurer whose policies it issues (§ 626.841(1)). Both are on the public record: the DFS licensee search shows an agent's or agency's license and appointments.

Bayit Title's are Florida Title Insurance Agency License W806540, and Florida Title Agent License W766033 for our Agent in Charge, Shevy Lowenstein. Our policies are underwritten by First American Title Insurance Company.

What lets the search start the same day and the questions get asked once:

• the fully executed contract with every addendum and counter-offer;
• the buyer's and seller's names as they will sign, and a phone number and email for each;
• the lender and loan officer, if there is a loan;
• the association's name and management contact, for a condominium or HOA;
• any survey the seller has, and the seller's owner's policy from their own purchase, for the reissue rate;
• anything already known: a seller abroad, an estate, a company or trust as seller, recent work on the property.

Open an order takes all of it in one form, with the contract as an attachment.