Paul Watkins: the hidden risks in property that could financially ruin buyers

Every year, Queensland buyers settle on properties with hidden risks they never saw coming. From unapproved building work and boundary disputes to title defects and fraud.

In episode 23 of Raising the Bar, George Sourris from Empire Legal sits down with Paul Watkins, General Counsel at Stewart Title Australia, to unpack one of the most overlooked forms of buyer protection in Australian property: title insurance. 

With more than 20 years at the forefront of title insurance, legal reform and property risk management, Paul breaks down what title insurance actually is, why so many Australians still don’t know about it and the real life claims that can cost buyers tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars.

We cover:

- Title insurance explained: what title insurance actually covers, why it protects buyers for the life of ownership, how it differs from standard conveyancing due diligence and why it remains one of the most under-utilised risk management tools in Australian property.

- Real claims and hidden landmines: the most common title insurance claims in Queensland, including unapproved structures, boundary encroachments, council enforcement action and fraud, plus the real stories that show just how costly hidden property issues can become.

- Raising the bar in buyer protection: what lawyers, conveyancers, lenders and real estate agents need to do better when it comes to educating buyers, managing property risk and ensuring clients understand what their legal representation does and doesn’t cover.

If you’re buying property or working in real estate, this episode is a reminder that protecting your biggest asset starts with understanding the risks most buyers don’t even know exist.

Contact Paul: https://www.stewartau.com/about-us/leadership-team
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More podcast episodes: https://empirelegal.com.au/podcast/
Check out our blogs: https://empirelegal.com.au/blog/
Website: https://empirelegal.com.au/

Transcript

George: Alright. Season three of the Raising the Bar podcast. We've got an interstate guest today, Paul Watkins, General Counsel from Stewart Title Australia. Mate, thank you for making the trek up and for coming on the show.

Paul: No, thanks for having me. It's great to be on the podcast.

George: You're my first interstater, so there you go, mate. Fantastic. Thank you very much.

Paul: Fantastic. What an honor.

George: Thank you, sir. I'm going to read a couple of things and we're going to get into it.

Paul: Alright.

George: Ready to roll?

Paul: Looking forward to it.

George: Alright. Every year in Queensland, property buyers settle on homes with illegal structures, boundary encroachments, unpaid rates and fraud they never saw coming. Most of them had no idea they could have been protected for the cost of a nice dinner. Today on Raising the Bar, we're pulling back the curtain on title insurance. What it is, why most buyers don't have it, and the wild claim stories that will make you rethink every property transaction you've ever been involved in.

[Welcome to the Raising the Bar podcast, where we story tell excellence in Queensland Property. I'm your host, George Sourris from Empire Legal.]

George: How's that for an opener?

Paul: Oh, pretty good. Pretty accurate.

George: Yeah. We've got a few things to unpack today, mate. I'm keen, this has been a long time coming, actually. I think over a year ago we first started chatting with you guys, with Charlotte and Simon to get you up here, so thanks for your patience.

Paul: Yeah, not at all.

George: And we bring it to life. Yeah. So yeah, we've been working with you guys for years now, and I think that certainly your business needs to be amplified, especially up here in Queensland. Queenslanders need to know what it is and then they can make an informed decision on whether they grab it or not, right?

Paul: Yeah, absolutely.

George: You are the general counsel at Stewart Title Australia responsible for managing and underwriting through the legal department, covering policy reform, regulatory compliance, claims, and real estate fraud. You've been a regular contributor to Australian legal publications on the benefits of title insurance and regularly presenting to lawyers, conveyancers and lenders across the country on title insurance claims management and real estate fraud. As I said, we've worked with you guys for a while now and we want to get that message out there. I've got a fun fact mate, and then it's your turn to talk.

Paul: Sure. Sounds good.

George: So as per my research, you started in private practice before joining Stewart Title in 2004.

Paul: Yes.

George: So we're talking 22 years ago.

Paul: That's right. Part of the furniture now.

George: So mate, you've been living and breathing this niche area of the law for a while.

Paul: Over two decades, absolutely.

George: And pioneering it in Queensland and I'd say Australia wide. Yeah, yeah. Which is very, very cool. So yeah, it's an honor to have you sitting here, mate.

Paul: Yeah. Thank you.

George: You've seen property transactions from both sides of the fence - law degree from University of Canberra, admitted as a solicitor in New South Wales, ACT, Queensland, and the High Court.

Paul: Yeah.

George: Very, very cool. That is a prestigious honour mate. Well done. And in 2019, finalist for Insurance Lawyer of the Year at Lawyers Weekly Corporate Counsel Awards. Not bad for a bloke that spent two decades quietly protecting Queenslanders from disasters they didn't even know were coming.

Paul: Absolutely.

George: On that note, first topic, let's just jump into it. What is title insurance and why doesn't everyone have it?

Paul: Well, it's a great question, because a lot of people don't know what title insurance is. Not only in Queensland but around the country generally.

George: We were talking just off air, right? We're in our eighth year of business here, and only in the last couple of years did we find you guys and learn more about it. And I just look back now and think that's wild. For all those years it had never come across my desk.

Paul: Yes, absolutely.

George: And we've done thousands of transactions.

Paul: Yeah. Yeah. Particularly because it's an insurance that is linked to conveyancing specifically.

Paul: I like to get people thinking about title insurance in terms of when they're buying a property, your clients, what they're really seeing is, you know, the gardens and the house and the furniture and the ambient lighting and the pool. But what they're not seeing is all of the legal regulations and processes behind the scenes, that went towards creating that lot in the first place. The process that went ahead with constructing the house. And then the processes, or the legal rules and regulations that govern the ongoing use of that property. Real estate assets are probably one of the most highly regulated assets in the country.

George: And a lot of people aren't aware that when they're buying property, they're also buying an asset that has to comply with the Planning Act and the Building Act, and planning laws and zoning laws and building codes of Australia. There's a lot to it, right?

Paul: Yeah, there's a lot to it. So what title insurance really does is it protects a buyer in these circumstances, where they buy a property and the previous owners have done things like replace fences, without regard to the legal boundaries. They haven't observed the legal boundaries. Knocked a fence down, rebuilt it, but they've put that fence wherever they want, really, without reference to where that fence should go.

George: Yeah. Because you think about surveyors, right? And I feel like in the building world, maybe that's only really thought about for a new build, where they're pegging a block or they're building the house. I don't think people make that connection of going when they're putting a new fence or a shed or anything like that going, oh, I better check that it's right on the boundary and get it surveyed. And some prudent people will, but I'd say the majority maybe don't.

Paul: They don't.

George: Yeah.

Paul: And the other problem too, on new builds is, when the surveyors leave their little survey marks, if they leave those survey pegs there long enough, kids sometimes ride their bikes past and steal them. And when there's construction going on and there's heavy machinery, excavators, they get trampled underfoot. So by the time that the first builder rocks up to start to put the fence in, those survey pegs are long gone. And so it's a little bit of a guesstimate as to where those fences go in the first place. So you end up with a boundary issue from the get go.

George: Yeah. Wow.

Paul: And then that boundary issue may exist for many, many years until the new buyer comes along. For some reason, they're doing further development on the property. They get a survey done and they discover these boundary fence encroachments that may have been there for 10 plus years.

George: Yes.

Paul: So that's one of the fundamental risks. Another risk in Queensland in particular, is where during the life of a property, a previous owner decides to renovate or extend or put on a garage or a carport. Or convert a garage into a family room.

George: Yeah.

Paul: They further improve the property. But in Queensland like the rest of Australia, a lot of that building work requires a permit under the Planning Act, under the Building Act. And a lot of people aren't aware of that. So you end up with a lot of unapproved building work issues in Queensland. And that's a risk that passes on to a new buyer. And unless they're aware of it, if the local authority, the local council becomes aware of that unapproved building work, then they've got enforcement powers under the Planning Act. They can issue a show cause notice.

George: Yes.

Paul: Which is effectively a notice to demonstrate to council that the unapproved building work is building code compliant, satisfies planning laws and zoning laws. And if it doesn't, then you as the new owner, have to demolish those unapproved structures at your cost, even when you weren't responsible for building them.

George: Buyer beware, right?

Paul: Buyer beware.

George: Caveat emptor.

Paul: Absolutely. And culturally in Australia, I mean, one of the most highest rating shows on Australian television was a show called The Block. And what was The Block all about? Bunch of amateurs doing a do it yourself renovation.

George: Yeah. Literally.

Paul: And so, you know, Australians love to renovate, and we are very big on the do it yourself trend. And so people are renovating properties, putting on decks, pergolas, adding rooms, and they're so focused on what it looks like, and the finishes. But they're not focused on, should we be doing this at all in the first place?

George: They're focused on the emotional, the aesthetic. Yes, you're right. And law is boring. What the consequence, ah, who cares? Yeah. I want it to just look great so I can have my family and friends over and show them how great my reno is.

Paul: And it's also complicated. So even, you know, I've been a lawyer for over 24 years now, and I still go cross-eyed trying to make sense of planning laws. I get friends and family who ring me, oh, Paul, you're a lawyer. I want to build this structure on my property. Can I do it? Okay. Let's have a look at what the zoning is and what the planning scheme says. Good luck. Is it exempt? Is it complying? It can be very, very difficult and complicated. And so a lot of people might even do an initial look. Oh yeah, I have a - ah, geez. It's all too hard. Ah, I'll just do it anyway.

George: Yeah.

Paul: And then, what's the worst that could happen? So we see a lot of those sort of issues. And that's really where the title and title insurance comes from. Because whenever a client buys a property where there is boundary discrepancies or there's unapproved building work, that gives rise to enforcement action, or legal action potentially either by the neighbour or by the local authority. And once that enforcement action is underway, that creates a cloud on the title. You can't sell that property with those issues unresolved.

George: Well said. Because they will appear. Absolutely. They'll be like a big black mark. And we're not talking hundreds of dollars here. We're often talking tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands potentially, if we're talking unapproved structures, or boundary where there's been something built that has to get demolished. Yeah. Not to mention time, stress, court. Absolutely. It's a long, dark road.

Paul: And what we find in the claims experience that we've had, not just in Queensland, but the rest of the country, is that your neighbours are all lovely people. You have them over for a barbecue on the weekend. You wave at each other. And that can be a beautiful relationship, right up until the point where your neighbour discovers that your fence is one metre onto their property.

George: Yeah.

Paul: Or vice versa.

George: Then you're public enemy number one, because you have stolen their land.

Paul: Then all of a sudden, you know, there's a chill factor at play. And we see that all around the country with the increase in real estate. You know, what you could buy a house for in Brisbane 10 years ago, compared to what you can buy a house for in Brisbane now. In Sydney for example, I can't remember the median house price, but it's up around $1.7-$1.8m. Median house price in Sydney.

George: Yeah.

Paul: So you are looking at millions of dollars. So a one metre encroachment is significant. Yes. I mean, people will kill each other over that, literally. So it's something that does create neighbour disputes and legal disputes. And without some form of coverage for that, people are exposed to significant loss.

George: So explain to me then, if you were to elevator pitch, what title insurance is. Say, you know, here's me, I'm going to buy a house. What is it? Why do I need it? What's it do?

Paul: Okay. In real simple terms.

George: The real simple terms version is...

Paul: Title insurance protects buyers against non-compliance with planning and zoning laws and boundary defects and other defects affecting the title to the land, which they weren't aware of when they bought the property, and which the conveyancing process doesn't necessarily bring to light. And you need it like any insurance. You don't need any insurance until you need it.

George: Yeah.

Paul: And so that's really where the title insurance policy comes into play. In Queensland, like the rest of the country, we have a very good land title system. Guarantees title to the land, but it falls short of providing cover against all of those zoning, planning, building boundary disputes, which now regulate the use of property.

George: And the reality of that right, is you think about the conveyancing process, you've been living and breathing this for decades. I've been doing it for about a decade now. The reality is, people don't want to pay more money than they think they have to for things. For example, with conveyancing, like, oh, do I need all these extra searches or do I need this? So to do all the due diligence to uncover what could potentially be a problem, in my opinion, the search costs alone would probably outweigh the cost of getting a title insurance policy, right? It's just not economical for people to do every search under the sun. We often get, we joke about, it's usually like engineers in particular that tick all these optional searches on, and then we go through and we actually say to them, hey, look, if you add up all these optional searches, your $2,500 conveyance is now like $10,000. Like, are you sure you want to do that? And we help them navigate what's maybe worth doing for their situation. But something like title insurance, correct me if I'm wrong, the rough price point, is it still about $1,000 per million of purchase price?

Paul: Yeah, roughly. Yeah.

George: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because that's just a rule of thumb. I don't know if that's still correct. When, about a year or so ago. Yeah. That's what we was doing is a rough price point. Can you explain how it works in terms of the policy? Because it's a unique insurance, isn't it, where you pay up front, and it lasts for life.

Paul: That's right. Yeah. So it's a one off payment. So the premium is paid on settlement. That will then result in a policy having been issued to the insured, but then they'll be insured for as long as they own the property. And it's not an ongoing premium like other insurance products. They're charging consumers a premium each year, because they're covering the next 12 months. Title insurance doesn't look forward, it looks back in time.

George: Which is unique.

Paul: Which is very unique.

George: Yeah.

Paul: So it's saying you bought this property, but what we are providing cover for is for boundary defects or unapproved building work issues that are already present on the property. They just haven't surfaced their ugly heads yet. They may in the future. And so that's what the premium is paid for. The other thing, George, that I find with a lot of the costs associated with searches and especially including things like surveys, is you have to look at your standard form contract for sale in the jurisdiction where you're practicing and say, what rights and remedies does that due diligence give the consumer in any event?

Paul: So for example, you will say to a client who's buying a property, look, you could actually survey the property, survey the boundaries, and you do that after contracts are signed, but before settlement. And that survey shows that there is a relatively minor encroachment of the neighbours eaves and gutters over the land that your client's buying. And they bring that survey to you and say, look, we got the survey. And you say, and?

George: Great. Yeah, great. Isn't that terrific? Well, that - what did that cost you?

Paul: It's a little bit counter-intuitive, but due diligence is really only as good as the rights and remedies that it gives you, if you do that due diligence. So it's all good and well to say, okay, well, we're going to spend $5,000 on searches, including a building record search. So a building record search will reveal what the council has in records of what approvals have been issued for the property. By definition, it's not going to give you a record of what's not been approved.

George: Correct.

Paul: So it's really up to the person who's acquiring that search to then take the building approval search and compare that with what's physically on the property. And then they've got to do all that heavy lifting.

George: So, you guys would obviously, as part of your own due diligence process, do searches and whatnot to try and reveal like any potential issues upfront? Right?

Paul: No, we don't do any searches.

George: Okay.

Paul: We are an insurance company, so there's an element of risk assumption on our part.

George: Right.

Paul: So it's a risk that we assume under the policy. From an underwriting point of view, what we might do is look at the listing photos. And that's really just to identify structures that for us historically have given rise to a high volume of claims. So for example, things like secondary dwellings. If there is a secondary dwelling on a property, then that would give us some trepidation about whether we want to provide full cover for that secondary dwelling, without some further investigations being done.

George: Because granny flats now, I know with Brisbane City Council and a lot of greater Brisbane, the LGAs are playing ball with encouraging people to do that. But yeah, to your point, it's no different to a carport being unapproved - except now we've got a whole dwelling with plumbing and electrics, and boundaries and legal... I don't know, steps and ramps and all sorts of stuff that need to be considered.

Paul: Yeah. It could be, you know, hundreds of thousands of dollars.

George: Mm.

Paul: And the other thing that people don't realise, is that when council discovers unapproved work, and they issue a show cause notice on the property, what council's requiring is that the property owner at the time the show cause is issued - you have to demonstrate to council that the structures as built, comply with all of the relevant building codes and standards as at the date the show cause notice is issued. So if the show cause notice was issued last week, then it's incumbent upon the property owner to demonstrate that structure complies with the building code as at last week.

George: Today, not when it was built. Which it might have been okay 10 years ago, but now it's a problem.

Paul: Exactly. And generally it is a problem, because the building code, national construction codes, they move on. The codes that applied 10 years ago in some respects are completely different to what exists today. So in our claims experience, when unapproved building work is discovered by a council, and a show cause notice is issued, it's very rare that our insureds are able to 'show cause' to council that the unapproved structure is fully compliant. There's always some retrospective work or issues that needs to be rectified. Yeah. So it's a big risk. Just within the legal framework.

George: Even small things add up. We had an incident with a bit of a water issue in our house last year and, um, you know, we had home insurance and they shipped us off into temporary accommodation and fixed it all up and yeah. Even in that time, and the house isn't too old, the code had changed. Yes. And they said, no, your laundry and your bathroom, now we've got to put a step up. It was all flat. Now there's a little step up into the laundry and into the bathroom, that didn't exist. So when they did the retiling, there's now this lip and I'm like, man, but the house isn't even that old. Yeah. So that's a very minor example, right? But to even to re-tile those rooms, that's not a cheap operation, let alone something like a secondary dwelling that doesn't comply.

Paul: Absolutely.

George: And when the council gets wind of it, I know each council has their own appetite. Some, I think from my experience in Greater Brisbane, I know for example, if Redlands gets onto it, you're in trouble. Yeah. Like, they will see it through and through and through. Whereas other ones maybe have been a little bit more relaxed. But once they get wind of it, they will chase you. And you inherit the problem. Right. That's right. It's now your problem.

Paul: That's right. So liability for compliance with enforcement orders from a council, lies with the property owner at the time that the work's discovered. It's not like council says, okay, well, we think this person from 14 years ago did that work. We are going to go track them down and issue a show cause notice on them. Those sorts of liability issues run with the land. It's really like musical chairs. It's just who owns the property at the time the council discovers the issue? And then if you have the bad luck to be in that spot, then all of a sudden you're looking at potentially a huge compliance issue, caused by somebody who might have built that 10, 15 years ago in the past.

George: Yeah.

Paul: And what we see in our claims is that unapproved building work structures don't come labeled. So it looks like a perfectly acceptable property. You know, you walk in - I mean, some of the claims we've seen, the workmanship appears to be top-notch.

George: Yes.

Paul: But what happens is once you take the gyprock off and look behind the framing. Is the framing being built to code? Is the foundation or the slab compliant? Is the span between the frames on the roof compliant? Is the pitch compliant? Like it's so highly regulated. Building work.

George: The cost to even do that exploratory stuff, right? You talking about removing gyprock and getting specialists out, like even that is stressful, expensive. Thousands.

Paul: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

George: And that's the start of the process. That's to find out what's wrong.

Paul: That's right. Absolutely. So yeah, it's one of those issues that unfortunately in Australia, the common law of the country says, like you mentioned before, it's very much a caveat emptor - buyer beware. Sellers are only required to disclose outstanding notices that they're aware of. Where the actual enforcement action's already been commenced. The seller has already received correspondence from council. In those circumstances then, sellers have obligations to disclose those things to buyers. But in a lot of cases, the sellers themselves have inherited these unapproved building work issues. They're not even aware of them.

George: Yeah. They don't even know.

Paul: They don't even know.

George: Yeah.

Paul: And even if they are responsible for building work without a permit, they're not responsible or liable or required to disclose that.

George: Even with the seller's disclosure update here in Queensland last August (2025) that came in, which added a whole shopping list of mandatory disclosures - yes, unapproved structures, it's not mandatory. It's not part of the Form 2 disclosure statement regime.

Paul: Correct. And to your point, I think the vast majority wouldn't even know. I think about, I bought a place a few years ago, uh, down the coast at Paradise Point, old little pocket, old low set brick homes. They all used to be three bed, one bath, that was sort of, you know, the recipe. And that pretty much every house in that little pocket has been converted. They've made the master bedroom with an ensuite from the garage, so it's become a four bed, two bath, and they put a carport on the front.

George: Yeah.

Paul: And I've just been thinking since we started chatting, I'm like, I wonder how many of those homes actually got everything done properly with the approvals and signed off. Because almost all of those original homes, I'm certain were three ones and now they're four twos. Yeah. With carport.

George: Yeah.

Paul: Yeah.

George: Yeah.

Paul: And that's very common. That's just part of the fabric of buying property. People don't buy a 1950s home, or a house that was built in the sixties or the seventies. They don't hang onto it without updating it or changing it or modernising it. Renovation, maximizing your living space. You know, the humble garage, a lot of people now say, you know what, I need room for my family. Does my Datsun 120B really need its own home, under the roof? No, it doesn't. It can live out in the driveway. We can put a carport over that. And then we can reclaim that space and we can turn it into a family room.

George: Yep.

Paul: A lounge room. We can convert it into a bedroom. And that's a very common renovation tactic - to turn your three bedroom home into a four bedroom home.

George: Yep. Second bathroom, happy days. You've got way more space now.

Paul: That's right.

George: Yeah. And that's what we see, where people are trying to maximize the living space in their properties. Because they're paying so much for housing now. You want to get maximum bang for your buck. And this is why I don't want to jump too far down the rabbit hole, but you look at building costs that have all happened now, I know like even PVC piping's gone up 30, 40% since all this Strait of Hormuz stuff, and you've got construction costs going through the roof, fuel crisis. Like we thought building was already expensive, and we've seen so many developers and builders go under or really struggle. I don't think we're at the worst of it yet.

Paul: No. It's going to get worse.

George: Yeah.

Paul: Yeah. And what's happened is this wonderful company called Bunnings has come along. And people who are inspired to do some renovation work, but they look at the costs and they, you know, they reel from the quote. Six figures to do a letter box, what?!

George: Yeah.

Paul: But you can go into Bunnings and you can basically buy all the materials there. A lot of them are selling prefab granny flats now. You can get a flat pack granny flat for, you know, I think it's $20,000.

George: Wild.

Paul: So you build it yourself. Yeah. Wild. Put it in the backyard.

George: Yeah.

Paul: So yeah, definitely over the last few years we've seen an uptick in people modifying homes, improving them, creating more living space. And the question of building permits is secondary to getting the work done, and achieving a result.

George: Oh, we'll do that later, or I'll worry about it later. And then most of the time you just forget, and you don't bother tidying up the loose ends, and it just sits forgotten about.

Paul: And unfortunately, you got to think of it as, you know, these are landmines in your conveyancing file.

George: Of course. And look, the people doing the home job, Bunnings renos, like, great. But you're not a builder, you're not a plumber, you're not a whatever. How do you know what the code is. And not only that, if you don't get it signed off, as you mentioned earlier, which I didn't connect those dots. If the building code changes, it's not compliant. You're right. You've got literal landmines.

Paul: Yeah.

George: And to your other point, even if you find these problems throughout the conveyance, which I'd say not even 1% of people even try to explore that, what's the recourse? Okay, great, you spend all this money, or maybe we can get you out of the contract or whatever it might be. But you're in the hole pretty bad with what you've spent just to walk away and start again.

Paul: Yeah. And you could be in a legal dispute about that?

George: Yeah. Yeah. Because, as you mentioned before, Queensland's come on board with the mandatory seller disclosure, but it has its limits. If the issue itself doesn't fall under that regime, then unless the contract contains very specialised special conditions that are tailored towards this issue, which I rarely ever see in Queensland, then there's no obvious contractual remedies. There's no vendor warranties in relation to that. And there's no mandatory vendor disclosure about it. So it hasn't really shifted the dial in favor of buyers terribly much, the new laws. It certainly is great to see in Queensland, but for these issues that we are talking about, it really hasn't changed much in terms of the risk.

George: It's a good start. I think it's trending in the right direction, but you're right, it is version one.

Paul: Yes.

George: And on top of that, even if there is a problem, I did say yes, we can try and get you out of the contract. But if there's no terms for that, then what you've got is me over here trying to get my client out. You over there going, no, no, no, your client's locked in. And that's when, you know, deposits are sitting in a trust account pending court case. And then stress, money, lawyers. It's a bit messy.

Paul: Absolutely. It can be. So I mean, from our point of view, our message has always been, look, we are an insurance company. We don't want to change the way that conveyancing is done. We don't require or mandate that conveyancing transactions be done in a particular way. Our message is always going to be that there is already an inherent risk with buying a property. And the lawyers and the conveyancers do the absolute best they can, but they're not the gatekeepers for all issues in relation to that property. So there has to be some acknowledgement from consumers and buyers that, hey, we've got to do a bit of homework ourselves. We've got to do a bit of this heavy lifting ourselves. And title insurance is just a weapon in their arsenal. They can basically now insure themselves against those issues, as a risk management tool.

George: So on that note then, as I understand it, there's you guys, then there's a competitor. There's pretty much only two companies doing it in Australia, right? Yeah. Like, as far as I'm aware of, yeah.

Paul: Yeah.

George: I feel like this topic should have more airtime. What you guys do, how you protect all the properties around the country. What's your - I mean, you've been in the game a while. What's your thoughts on why doesn't mainstream media and people know about you guys and what you do?

Paul: Yeah. I mean, it's a constant source of, um, you know, wonderment to me as well.

George: Yeah. After I met with you guys and found out about the offering. I'm like, we need to offer this to our clients. And we're not in the business of pushing anything, but all we do is just give them the data, and say, look. This is what it is. This is how it can protect you. If you want it, you can have a no obligation chat. And if you don't want it, that's okay too. But me, as the person helping guide you through this journey, and my team, you should know about this. And if the conveyancer down the road isn't telling you about it, then maybe you need a better conveyancer.

Paul: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

George: Yeah.

Paul: The thing with title insurance compared to say your home and contents insurance is that title insurance is a highly specialised area. So most general insurers in Australia aren't skilled or qualified to do it. They do what they do, which is issue home and contents insurance. And as you're probably aware, when your clients buy a property and they borrow money from a bank, the bank mandates that home insurance. Yes. Because at the end of the day that property is the bank's security, and the bank wants that home protected against damage destruction. So that's where I think most of the mind space is at. Is that this concept of when you think insurance, buying property, you think home insurance and contents insurance. I've got to get this. It's part of my loan requirements. But those issues that we are talking about, they're not as in the public mind. They're not really thinking about those things. Because like I said from the beginning, is that you don't look at a house that you've just fallen in love with and offered to buy, and people don't go, ooh, I wonder if that fence is on the boundary? And I wonder if that pergola has been built with a permit? So that's why I think our conversation today, this podcast is really great, because it's going to reach more people, it's going to raise the awareness.

Paul: And I think, you know, we've been going in Australia now for around 25 years. So in relative terms, that's pretty short time compared to say, you know, how long general insurers have been operating generally in Australia.

George: Yes.

Paul: So I imagine if I was young enough to be around for the next 25 years...

George: I think you'll be right, mate. I think, yeah, I think you'll be around in 25 years.

Paul: And I can sit down and say, well, you know, 50 years on, I suspect that the level of awareness will be much higher in that time. Yes. I think it's one of those products that, every year the level of awareness does get better and better, and we are on that journey.

George: Yeah. And it's forums like this that sort of allow it to get more reach. Yeah. I was really impressed with the amount of our clients in the last couple of years since we've been offering the service that are taking it up. It's to me, very good. People are obviously reading the brochure and the information and going, ah, only spend, you know, $1,000, $2,000, depending on the price point, whatever it might be, and I'm protected. Just, as a testimonial, we were chatting just before the episode started, we bought about a year ago. I got it. Yep. And I'm glad that I'd met Charlotte and Simon and yourself and I knew about it. Because the property before, yeah, like I'm in this world and I didn't know about it, and I didn't have it. And I definitely would've because I think, you know, if there is a problem down the track and it rears its head - peace of mind.

Paul: Well, I've got it on my own property as well. What I find is that when people do hear about title insurance for the very first time, and they hear about what the risks are and how it covers them for those risks, the most common expression I get is, it's a no-brainer. It's a no-brainer.

George: I've had friends that have sort of, because we send out a pack of information and say, do you want more information or not? And that's how we offer the service. And people will contact me and go, oh, George, do I need this? I say, look, you don't need it. I said, but I got it. I said, you should read it and you should make a decision. But yeah, I think for what it costs, to what you get, it is a no-brainer.

Paul: Yeah.

George: It's a no-brainer.

Paul: It's pretty good value, because you pay that premium on settlement and if you hold onto the property for 10 years, then that's the only premium you're going to pay in that 10 years.

George: Yeah. And if you annualize it, it's basically nothing.

Paul: It really is nothing. Like you said at the beginning, for the cost of a nice dinner. And the longer that you own the property, that nice dinner - I mean, it starts to turn into Maccas. I mean, for the cost of Maccas each year, you're covered for this. There's no excess payable on claims either, which is very rare in this insurance world. Most insurances that your listeners will have, whether it's home insurance, travel insurance, motor vehicle insurance or any professional insurance, professional indemnity.

George: That's a scary one, mate.

Paul: Yeah, that's a lot of money. And some of those deductibles and excesses, can make you wonder about the value proposition of the product at all. Geez, why do I bother with this insurance if I'm going to be, uh, paying the first, you know, $50,000-$60,000 of loss, what's the point? So with a title insurance policy, there's no excess. So to make a claim it costs the insured nothing. It certainly adds to the value proposition.

George: Back to the no brainer comment mate.

Paul: Absolutely.

George: On that note, let's push on to the second point then, which is, let's jump down the rabbit hole a bit more in terms of real life examples. So you briefly mentioned at the start, if you just want to maybe rehash it here, what's the most common stuff that you see? And then do you have a couple of quick war stories that you can share of how it's protected some real clients and what you've seen?

Paul: Absolutely. So, and specifically in Queensland, what we see in Queensland is two types of claims. The unapproved building work claims and the boundary claims. They are the two highest source of claims in Queensland. But we also get claims in relation to errors that can be made in the conveyancing process, that lead to a situation where somebody buys a property, but they don't end up with title to that property.

George: That's scary.

Paul: I'll give you an example of that.

George: Yeah. So a typical claim in Queensland is, client buys a property. They don't get a building record search. Or even if they do, it just has very generic information about a house being built back in 1983.

Paul: Oh, it looks about right. Yep.

George: No worries. It's alright. They don't get a survey done. They settle on the property. But 9 out of 10 times, what brings a claim is those insureds then want to do further works on the property themselves. So after they own the property, they're now going to lodge and do the right thing this time, and they're going to lodge a building permit application for an extension or to put a swimming pool in or to do something further on the works on the property.

Paul: And do the right thing. Do the right thing.

George: And just to your point then, just for the listeners. To give the listeners context, we do hundreds of conveyances a month, every month. And you'd be flat out to see not even one a month where someone has actually engaged a surveyor. And we help all walks of life from mum and dads, to sophisticated developers. And when we are involved in this process, I can't remember once where a surveyor has been involved. And I can count less than one a month where they'd actually pay for the building approval searches. Yeah. So we're talking 99.99% of people don't do this stuff.

Paul: Absolutely.

George: So continue. So they've taken that risk on when they bought the property.

Paul: Yep. And they want to do their reno, they're going to do the right thing. Six weeks later, they put their application in to council.

George: Yep.

Paul: So what that does is that brings that property to the attention of council. Maybe for the first time since that property was first built. And that's when the council goes along and discovers in dealing with that permit application for the further works, hang on a sec - our approved plans that we have on file don't match what's been built. We don't have an extension there. We don't have that large patio pergola structure. And then all of a sudden, the council's issuing your client with a show cause notice in relation to prior unapproved works. So we've had numerous claims in Queensland where that's happened. Where it could be patios, rear decks, we've had a few of those. We had a really interesting one in a place called Strathdickie.

George: That's new to me.

Paul: Strathdickie is up in the Whitsundays.

George: Okay.

Paul: It's not far from Airlie Beach.

George: Nice part of the world.

Paul: And our insured bought this property, and it had been previously damaged by Cyclone Debbie. It had been cyclone damaged. And the previous owner had made an insurance claim. That insurance claim had been accepted and covered, and the insurance company had engaged a private certifier to do the repair works. But the previous owner said, oh, you know what, I might take this opportunity whilst all these repair works are being done, to do some further works on the property on my own dollars. So the insurance company's going to pay $100,000 in storm damage, and then I'm going to take this opportunity to do this and this, and extend this and open this up, and I'm going to engage the very same private certifier that the insurance company has.

George: Okay.

Paul: To sign it all off.

George: To sign it all off.

Paul: Yeah. Great. So the insurance company does the right thing. They do everything. The private certifier certifies all the repair damage off, final inspection approvals, all done. But then they're now waiting on the owner to do the other works that's outside of the insurance.

George: Outside of the insurance.

Paul: And they don't get that done. The certifier writes a letter to the previous owner and says, look, we did a final inspection and this hasn't been done. This hasn't been complied with. You need to do this, this, and this in order for us to be able to finalise this aspect of your building permit. And what does the previous owner do? They just ignore that - they do nothing. A year later, they sell the property.

George: Right.

Paul: Now the buyer does a building record search.

George: Okay, they can see there's an approval for some storm damage. They can see there's an approval and record for some further works. They think this is terrific.

Paul: Yeah. Great. Yeah. It's all been done properly.

George: Marvelous.

Paul: Yeah, it looks good on paper.

George: Then they settle, they move in.

Paul: Yeah. So this is an actual claim. This is not a hypothetical. This actually happened. They moved in, and then about six months later, the council, Whitsundays Council receive a notice from the private certifier saying, hey, the building approval that was issued, has now lapsed, right? And just to let you know, it's lapsed with all these issues having not been resolved by the previous owner.

George: Oh.

Paul: So now the council is issuing a notice to our insured as the new owner saying, look, got some bad news for you. Looks like the previous owner who did these further works never finalised that process. Now the building approval's lapsed. And so we are now treating those works as unapproved works, which you as the new owner are now liable to rectify, at your cost.

George: Not good is it?

Paul: Have fun with that. And that's an example of where a buyer can be lulled into a false sense of security even by getting the building record search, because it showed that there were approvals. But with the use of private certifiers now, it doesn't guarantee you that the approvals are being complied with. All the steps have been done. And in this case, the insured made a claim, because the council were treating those prior works as unapproved works. And so we had to come in and pay the costs of completing that process. So paying the cost of whatever the final inspection non-compliance items were. Yes. That all added up to about $27,000. So that was paid under the claim.

George: Great. So without the title insurance, that $27,000, that's an out-of-pocket expense because the council is just going to keep at them now, saying, you're in our cross hairs.

Paul: Yes.

George: You have a show cause, you have a certain timeframe, otherwise yeah, we're going to go you, right? Yeah.

Paul: And if you read the provisions of the Planning Act, the enforcement powers that council have, they've got teeth. I mean, the councils aren't just going to say, oh look, we sent you a couple of letters and you ignored it. Okay. You'll be right. We'll just leave it alone. They can take enforcement action themselves.

George: And they have a whole department, that's their job, right? Like this is our hit list. Absolutely. It's our job to tidy this up because that's the law.

Paul: So that's an example. We had examples where we had a property in Balmoral. Very expensive property. One of those properties that, the boundaries are pretty tight. It's a highly densely populated street. Our insured, post settlement didn't get a survey. But post settlement, wanted to do some further works. Extension in the back. They did the right thing again, went to council. Council said, well, you need to survey the boundaries so that we can be satisfied that your new structure is going to be built within the boundaries.

George: Yep. That's just a requirement of the works.

Paul: It's a requirement of the works. Yep. So they went ahead and did that, and that survey revealed that both boundary fences on both sides encroached onto the insured's land. All up, the encroachment - it wasn't massive. It was about 12.5 m2 on both sides. But again, you are paying a lot of money for that land. Over a million dollars for that property.

George: Yes.

Paul: Well over a million dollars. So the land value is significant. And now you've just discovered that the neighbour's fences have been built inside of your boundary, so you are not utilising all the land that your title actually gives you.

George: Yeah. No mate. Go move your fence because that's my land.

Paul: And that's what we did. We wrote letters to both neighbours on behalf of our insured, and both neighbours wrote back to us and said, we'll see you in court. And unfortunately in Queensland, there's a bit of a grey area legally about this concept of adverse possession or possessory title, over little bits of land. It got very messy. So ultimately we compensated the insured for the land that effectively they had lost. Because there was no clear right for us to get those fences moved back to the boundary. That would've potentially ended up in a very messy, costly, legal dispute. But those sorts of issues we see a lot.

Paul: The other example I talked about where they didn't end up getting title was an interesting one. It was a Queensland claim where the law firm who was acting for the seller in this case - so they're acting for the seller. The seller owned two properties. They owned their own home and they owned an investment property. And that law firm acted for that client in relation to both properties. And that client said, you know what? I want to sell my investment property. Can you prepare a contract for sale for me? But they accidentally put the title details for the client's home, rather than the investment property into the matter.

George: Into the practice software.

Paul: Yep. So it was just an inadvertent error, because they had two files open, and they looked at the wrong file, and then they put the title details from the wrong property into the new file. And nobody picked up on this error.

Paul: So contracts were prepared, the title details as expressed in the contract were different to the title reference. But no one picked up on this.

George: And not even on the buyer solicitor side either. We get the registered plan, take a screenshot, highlight the lot. Send it to the client. Say, please make sure this is the lot you are buying and let us know immediately if it's not. So everyone missed it?

Paul: Everyone was on auto mode.

George: Yep.

Paul: And there was an incoming mortgagee, so the banks lawyers missed it as well. And so our insured settled, moved into this one bedroom apartment, and then found out pretty quickly that the seller was still registered on the title.

George: Of course. Because normally just for the listeners out there, once settlement goes through, goes to the titles office, notifies the council. Yep. And then the rates and the water changes to the new owner.

Paul: Yep. And that did not happen in this case. But interestingly, what our insureds found out, is they weren't the owner of the investment property that they purchased. But because the title details on the transfer were for that client's own home, they ended up becoming the legal owner of a vastly more expensive property.

George: Giddy up.

Paul: And so obviously that was a fundamental error that happened. But ultimately it's a title insurance claim that was covered, because one of the covered risks in a title insurance policy is you are not the owner of the estate or interest in the land insured under this policy, and in this case they weren't. So what happens? I mean, I can theorize, but I haven't lived through it. It's never happened to us, touch wood. So what do you do? You have to write letters to titles and...?

George: Yeah. So as you can imagine, the seller was very incentivised to have this issue rectified.

Paul: Oh, yep.

George: Uh, they'd just lost their penthouse apartment. So basically you just do a transfer swap.

Paul: Okay. And there'd be like an exemption with stamp duty.

George: Exemption. Fix the stamps or whatever it might be.

Paul: You have to go through a whole process. You have to explain to the Land Titles Office what has happened. Reassessment.

George: Yeah.

Paul: Get an exemption from stamp duty. And you just basically do a title swap back.

George: Got it.

Paul: Now, sounds like a fairly straightforward matter, but where the titles have got mortgages on them, it complicates things because then you need to uplift the titles. That means the mortgages, the banks have to provide their consent to that mortgage.

George: Mortgagee consent.

Paul: And that's a long process. That's not an overnight thing either.

George: No.

Paul: And without disparaging any of the law firms who act for mortgagees, they can charge quite a tidy sum of money to provide legal advice to their bank in terms of providing that mortgagee consent.

George: Right.

Paul: And those costs get passed onto the parties who need the problem rectified. So ultimately the claim was made, and we paid all the costs associated with getting the title rectified.

George: Beautiful.

Paul: And they ended up with the correct title. But that's a few examples. We have a lot of claims in Queensland, and they're just variations on that theme. It's just the structures themselves differ. And it's anything from decks, pergolas. We even had a claim recently involving a driveway crossover. So a crossover, for those who aren't familiar with that term, the listeners don't know what that means. When your driveway kind of moves out of your title, onto the road. So you've got that crossover from the private land onto the road. That's called a crossover.

George: Yep.

Paul: And most councils actually have very specific regulations about how those crossovers are to be constructed.

George: Yeah.

Paul: They have to comply with the crossover policy. Or the planning scheme in that place.

George: And the town planners normally deal with that and they make sure that it's all done in a way that complies to get signed off and, yeah.

Paul: Yeah. Yeah. So our insured bought a property, and then after settlement, somebody at council must have done a drive by and noticed that the driveway crossover didn't look right. And that led to a show cause notice being issued in relation to the crossover. And again, these are things that the lawyers who are acting for the buyers and the buyers themselves, the last thing they're thinking about when they buy these properties is, oh, I wonder if the crossover is compliant with the planning scheme?

George: Mate, it's way out of - like, it's way out of the scope. Our job is to help affect the legal title transfer, and then do our very, very best to mitigate the risk to the client, be it on the sale side or the buy side. But like we spoke about earlier, to actually try and cover every possible scenario, it's not cost effective at all. And 99.99% of people do not want to spend the extra money. It's like you said, it's going to cost this much. That's all I want to pay. And fair enough, right? And this conversation, this particular part has really brought to light to me, there's lots of landmines that you don't even know exist.

Paul: Exactly. What we've had over the years a few times is people have tried it on and said, oh mate, I bought this house six years ago and there's this issue, and why didn't you tell me about it?

George: And I said, mate, I had no idea. You know, it is way out of the scope. Like, it's my job to get you into this joint. Yeah. And we always ask the question, do you have any particular concerns? I think that's a really powerful question. Yeah. To start to uncover, to dig more like, what's your intended future use of the property? Yeah. But we can't know all the like... crossovers and, you know, fence boundaries and all this stuff. And I say, all right mate, yeah, you can go get a surveyor, it's going to cost you $2,000. They go no way. So I think the conversation now should be, and this is a good feeder, straight into our last point, is we're here to raise the bar, right? Yeah. And you are here to story tell excellence in Queensland property. That's the theme. Yeah. Because the industry deserves better. Yeah. Very passionate about trying to clean it up and make it better for everyday people, as the years progress, giving it a voice. So, how do we do better from your neck of the woods? Yeah. Like you've seen it happen over two decades, right? What's next? What can we do, just to round out this podcast to make it better for people? My 5 cents worth, and then it's over to you, is it's up to me to bring awareness to explain this. So I can say to these people, hey, look, we told you about title insurance. We asked you to have a no obligation chat, if you've got questions or you're interested. That's where we're at. You guys can really save people a lot of money and give them peace of mind for what's happened before, when they're flying blind. So, yeah, let's just talk a few minutes about that.

Paul: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I fully agree. My experience with dealing with Queensland lawyers, Queensland legal practitioners, is they overall do an absolutely superb job. And it's a very hard job. But I think what I would love to see, is a conversation or an approach that's taken where I think the legal profession become very specific about outlining precisely what their legal services are on a conveyancing transaction. And then saying, we are going to charge you this fee. And for this fee we are going to provide these services. These services do not extend to guaranteeing the boundaries or verifying the boundaries. These services do not extend to guaranteeing that all improvements on the property come with valid approvals, that all the building work on the property complies with those approvals. These are things that you have to satisfy yourself as the client, not our job. It's your job. Because what I've seen over the years is this concept that your clients think that the lawyer is the gatekeeper for all issues on a property. And that's not helped when an issue surfaces and everybody else in the transaction - who I won't name, but other parties in the transaction - the first thing they do is, oh, talk to your lawyer. It's their fault. They should have done that.

George: Yeah. Yeah. Well, you get the finger pointing.

Paul: You get the finger pointed.

George: And mate, we talk about raising the bar, and this is a pet peeve of mine. We've just seen this devaluation of professional services costing, especially in Queensland. I'm sure it's rampant around the country. In particular here, because obviously I know this jurisdiction. We've just seen it, you know, you see advertisements for $499, $599, $799 all inclusive, which it's very rarely all inclusive. It's always plus plus. But even so, these bargain bin mobs that have popped up, uh, conveyancing firms - I just don't believe that the everyday Queenslander is getting the service required and the risk management for what is such an important, important usually 30-ish days of their life. Yeah. For such an expensive thing. Their deposit is their life savings. And, you know, I sound like a broken record, but as you can tell, I'm very passionate about this.

Paul: Yeah, absolutely.

George: To then go, mate, you want me to know everything under the sun? And then I've got to compete with some bloke that reckons he's going to charge you $499 for it. Come on.

Paul: Yeah.

George: Come on. Absolutely.

Paul: And that brings me to my point, which is, what I'd like to see as somebody who's in the title insurance industry, is legal practitioners saying to their clients, you must be aware that this product exists.

George: Yes.

Paul: Yes. It's as simple as that. Yeah. It's insurance. So we're not going to mandate it. You have to want to buy it. But you've got, in my view, lawyers have got to bring their clients' attention to the fact that this insurance exists for their benefit. And that their legal services is not going to cover them for most of the subject matter that's going to be covered under a title insurance policy.

George: And that should be in highlighted big red, like what the conveyance does, what it doesn't do. Yes. And look, we have our own insurer, Lexon that we have to use here in Queensland, obviously for professional indemnity. And we have to give a booklet of information. Yeah. And I'm sure it's in there somewhere. What we do, what we don't do. But the feedback we get from the clients is, oh mate, you've sent me all this paperwork, there's hundreds of pages. I can't read it all. It's too much. So it would be nice if you guys were put in the same bucket as say your home and content insurer, because I would never advise a client to buy a house without getting insurance on it. And now the conversation for us is the same thing with the title insurance. Yeah. Saying, I'm not your father, I can't tell you whether you want to buy the insurance or not. Yeah. But you really do need to know about this. Because I think about what if someone's cash buying a place, and there's no obligation through the financier to get insurance, say for home and contents, and then the house burns down. I'm sure those people were like, mate I wish I knew about this insurance because I would've got it.

Paul: Yeah. Yeah. And in particular, yeah, using that example, I can almost guarantee you that the issues that are covered under a title insurance policy occur more frequently than the house burning down.

George: True. Yeah. It's more likely - it's more likely as a non-final inspection or an encroachment than a full fire loss.

Paul: Yeah.

George: True.

Paul: Yeah, true. You're paying this premium every year, hoping that your house doesn't burn down. I've owned my house for many decades, and it's never burned down. But yeah, absolutely. It's just that awareness. I think ultimately title insurance has to become part of the conversation in conveyancing. It's not just for the firms that focus on risk management or, oh, you know, we're a full service quality firm and so yeah we make title insurance available or tell our clients about it. I would encourage the listeners out there to go with the firms that are recommending title insurance, because what that tells me and should be telling them is that there's a risk management focus here. There's some value adding that's going on.

George: We care. Yeah. Yeah. We care about our clients. Like at the end of the day, we're doing them a disservice by not speaking about it. And to your point, if these other guys, these other conveyancing solicitors aren't at least educating their clients that it exists, they're doing the client a disservice. Yeah. And it's up to us to raise the bar. That's the whole point of this. The whole point of this is to get people like you on, to spread the good word about making, in particular, the Queensland property space better for everyday people. And I'm certain that the vast majority of everyday people don't know what it is and they've probably never been told about it. Like I'm - I was in the industry doing it, living and breathing it, and it hadn't come across my desk. And I'm glad now that it is getting more awareness. And I'm glad that through forums like this, mate, I hope there's other podcasts you can go on to talk about what you do because you guys have been sitting, what I perceive as quietly in the background protecting people. You should have more of a voice. Yeah. And it should have more media time going, hey, this is why you need it.

Paul: Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. I agree 100% George.

George: Well mate, on that note, we've got one more bit and we're done.

Paul: Alright.

George: It's called the Golden Nugget. So the Golden Nugget, for the listeners that may be tuning in for the first time, it's just one piece of advice that you want to give to the audience. Doesn't necessarily have to be lawyer related or title insurance related. It can be anything your heart desires that you think this audience will get some benefit from.

Paul: Well, I think my golden nugget follows the theme we've just been discussing, which is, when you buy a property, as we said earlier, it's going to be without a doubt, the most expensive purchase of your life. You are rarely going to be spending that amount of money on anything else. And so, my golden nugget would be, don't go straight to the cheapest services that you can get. I mean, at the end of the day, you get what you pay for. If you ever get bored and you want to sit down and read through Google reviews, what you'll read are lots of remorseful clients who said, you know what, I regret going with this firm, because I thought I was saving some money, but in fact, it's cost me way more. And at the end of the day, I've bought properties myself personally. And I went with the quality law firms that I know were going to provide me with a professional service. And if that came with a fee that reflected the service that I was going to receive, I'm happy to pay it. I'm happy to pay it, and more. So I think that would be my golden nugget. If you're going to buy a property, you should really look at investing in that. And if that investment is in quality legal representation and insurance, so be it. You won't regret it.

George: Mate, I couldn't have said that better. You are preaching what I live and what I believe in. And I do hope, I think it's a long battle, but I do believe, and I'm passionate about in the years to come, helping spread that awareness and the understanding. It's not a commodity. It's not a commodity. You're not buying bread or milk. Like this is serious stuff. And not all lawyers are created equal, and not all businesses are created equal. And you spoke about my favorite word, which is trust. You think about the Google reviews. If a firm has thousands of reviews with a five star average and you go through and you read the reviews, you think, yep, okay. I think we're onto something here. And to your point, on the flip side, we say to clients all the time, if they are price driven. Say, look, this is our fee and that's okay. Look at the competitors, mystery shop them. Call them up and ask for a quote. See if they pick up the phone, see if they're offshore. Read their Google reviews. And then you make a decision, if that few hundred dollars difference is worth the risk. Yeah. And ultimately, it's a free capitalist world. You can pick whoever you want. Absolutely. But you should actually spend a little bit of time and do some due diligence and make an informed decision.

Paul: Yeah. Yeah.

George: Well, mate, on that note, happy days. Thank you for the interstate commute.

Paul: No, that's alright. Thank you for your time. It's great to have you here on the show and I'm proud to be a part of this and to see it come to life.

George: Yeah. Yeah. Thanks for your time. It's great to have you here on the show. On that note then we'll put in the show notes, obviously how to link up with Stewart Title. Again, any client of Empire Legal's will obviously naturally have that no obligation introduction, and have as much education as they like. We've got Simon at the time of recording up here, who's amazing. He's our Queensland rep, and he will talk to any client, no obligation about what your service is, how it could help their particular needs and their particular property. And then if you like it, happy days.

Paul: Fantastic.

George: Beautiful mate. Thank you very much.

Paul: No worries. Thanks George.

George: Beauty.

Paul: Cheers.

George: Oh, man, that was great.