In the rare case that our in-house review process can not determine the availability of our Title Bridge Certificate, our staff can assist you with a quiet title action.
quiet title action
n. a lawsuit to establish a party’s title to real property against anyone and everyone, and thus “quiet” any challenges or claims to the title.
In fact, your title company may have already said you need to quiet title. When a title company looks at your property’s ownership history, they are looking at the “chain of title.” They want to make sure property has passed legally from one owner to the next. If there was an attempt to transfer ownership that wasn’t properly executed, it creates a break in the “chain.” Many title companies believe that a tax sale has the potential of creating one of those breaks in the chain. As a result, if there is a tax sale in the property’s history, they will ask you to quiet title.
Quiet title is a lawsuit filed in court to resolve ownership issues and declare the correct property owner. It is frequently used to remove encumbrances that have been satisfied or belonged to prior owners. For example, if the previous owner had a mortgage that wasn’t released or a leasehold was recorded that is no longer valid, it may be necessary to quiet title to remove those items.
Because quiet title is a legal proceeding, the time frame is typically very dependent on the court’s schedule. In a busy jurisdiction, it may take up to a year to get a judgment on a quiet title suit. Other factors can also influence the amount of time it takes to complete a quiet title action. If you only need to cure a break in the chain of title, the lawsuit may progress more quickly than if there are multiple parties claiming ownership.