The Tech Trap: Why Title Companies Shouldn’t Try to Be Tech Companies
We’ve all seen it.
A title company hits a roadblock—maybe it's growth, maybe it's integration friction—and the instinct is to build. Custom tools. Middleware. Their own version of a production system. At first, it feels like a smart move. You’re tailoring tech to your operation. You're solving problems. You’re innovating.
But fast-forward 18 months and that shiny solution starts to look more like a burden. Something breaks. The developer leaves. The “quick fix” becomes a legacy system with decade-old data and brittle integrations—and no one knows how it actually works.
This is what I call The Tech Trap.
The Illusion of Control
The problem isn’t that tech is bad. It’s that building and supporting tech is hard—a lot harder than most title companies realize. Whether it’s a tool layered on top of a title production system or a custom-built middleware solution designed to serve every client’s needs, eventually, something breaks.
And when it does, you don’t have a support team. You are the support team.
Unlike software companies that run on subscription revenue from hundreds or thousands of clients, your internal dev team is small. Sometimes it’s just one or two people. And because our industry is cyclical, so is your investment in tech. Teams grow when revenue is strong—but they shrink just as fast when volumes drop.
If you thought knowledge loss on your production floor was painful, just wait until you lose your lead engineer.
Why SaaS Works (And Why It’s Not a Dirty Word)
Software as a service is successful for a reason: it’s built to scale, supported by dedicated teams, and constantly maintained across a broad user base. When title companies take tech in-house, they take on all of that responsibility.
You’re now accountable for:
Hosting and uptime
Data security and backups
Ongoing development and maintenance
Support tickets and user bugs
Oh, and all those integrations you thought you solved? You’re maintaining those now too—for years.
So Should Title Companies Avoid Tech? Not Exactly.
To be clear: I’m not saying you can’t have something on-prem, or in-house. I’m saying: do it with eyes wide open. Be strategic. Be honest about what it will cost you—not just to build, but to support, maintain, and eventually rebuild.
If you're considering custom tech, ask yourself:
Does this give us a true competitive advantage?
Can we afford to support it long-term?
Are there proven tools we could use instead?
What happens if the person who built it leaves?
Final Take: Stick to Your Core
Title companies are not tech companies. And they don’t need to be. Your competitive edge isn’t in building software—it’s in mastering operations, client experience, and market knowledge. That’s where your focus should stay.
Use technology. Embrace smart tools. Automate the right things. But don’t fall into the trap of thinking custom software is a shortcut to better operations. If anything, it’s a long road—one that you’d better be ready to walk for years.
Thinking about your tech stack? Review it. Audit what’s working. And before building anything custom, ask whether it’s really your job to maintain it—for the next decade.
