Recently, an increasing number of my clients have been rejecting what I would consider reasonable estimated costs and turnaround times for commercial, industrial and more than average residential full searches.  One client said there was $200 (plus copies) allocated for a multi-million dollar factory report that looked like it would take about twenty hours to complete. 

$200 divided by 20 = $10/hour. Less taxes and expenses, that would pay less than minimum wage.  Working at that price, it seems unbelievable that the contracted searcher would have E&O insurance, and E&O is required by nearly everyone who works in the U.S.

So: who's doing the work at this rate? And why are title companies trusting it to be correct? 

As thing slow down, pricing will become a race to the bottom.  Before the 2008 melt-down, it seemed that title companies were too often replacing experienced examiners and underwriters with data entry technicians who understood procedure but not purpose. I wonder if this is happening again, with the quality of work being unwittingly undermined.

Certainly this isn't happening everywhere. Stronger companies with an eye to long-term survival will keep up their quality.  But this does seem to be trending.    

Thoughts, anyone?