Fort Lauderdale Title Company

They call Fort Lauderdale the Venice of America, and for once the nickname is earned rather than borrowed. The city threads roughly 165 miles of canals through its neighborhoods, and the moniker is right there on the city seal. It is a beautiful way to live, with a boat at the back of the house and the ocean a short cruise away. It also means that in a great many Fort Lauderdale transactions, the water is not a view; it is part of the legal description, and that changes what a careful closing has to look at.

The city itself grew up around water and a trading post. It takes its name from a series of forts built in 1838, and its oldest surviving building, the Stranahan House on the New River, dates to 1901, when Frank Stranahan ran the ferry and the trading post that anchored the early settlement. From those roots Fort Lauderdale became the largest city in Broward County and a market with real range: canal-front and Intracoastal estates, historic neighborhoods like Rio Vista and Colee Hammock, a downtown thick with newer condominium towers, and steady new construction throughout.

Waterfront property is where the diligence concentrates. A canal lot raises questions a dry lot never does, about the seawall and who is responsible for it, about dock rights and submerged-land lines, about exactly where the parcel ends and what the survey actually shows. A careful title search confirms the chain of title and raises anything out of place, an unreleased mortgage, an easement, a boundary question, as an exception in the title commitment, to be cleared before closing and stood behind by the owner's and lender's policies we issue through Commonwealth Land Title and First American. A current survey is central to that work on the water, showing whether the seawall, the dock, and the boat lift sit exactly where the record says and within the proper setbacks, so an encroachment is caught before it becomes your problem. On the condominium side, buying a unit means buying into the association that runs the building, so its finances, assessments, and disclosures all belong under the same careful eye, with the association's estoppel certificate confirming exactly what is owed at closing. We also coordinate the payoff of any existing mortgage and the release of old liens from the proceeds, so the buyer takes the property free and clear.

Closings like these, where a survey and a seawall can matter as much as the deed, are exactly where a boutique firm shows its value. Union Title Services has been closing Florida transactions since 1985, family-owned and counsel-led through the affiliated Law Offices of Thomas G. Sherman, P.A. We are based in Coral Gables, and because we close throughout Florida, a Fort Lauderdale file is familiar ground rather than foreign territory. The counsel-led part matters most when a waterfront question or an association issue needs an answer: an attorney is part of your file, not a referral you have to chase down.

Florida sets title premiums by law, so the rate is the same at every agency; the difference is who handles the file and whether you can reach them. When you call, you reach the people actually working your closing, with the lawyer in the same office instead of another city, and closing funds moved securely with wiring instructions confirmed by voice. We will treat a canal-front estate, a downtown condominium, and a straightforward inland resale with the same attention to the record and the survey. If a Fort Lauderdale closing is taking shape, whether you are the buyer, the seller, the lender, or the agent who wants a title partner that answers the phone, we would welcome the conversation. Call us at (305) 444-4508.