Fidelity National Consolidates Title Services to Increase ROI

In order to improve return on technology investments in its four title information services provider subsidiaries, Fidelity National Financial (FNF, Irvine, CA, $4.3 billion in assets) has combined the operations into one company called Property Insights.

Property Insights combines all of the automated title plant operations from Fidelity Title, Chicago Title, Ticor Title and Security Union. Property Insight's products include property tax information, images of maps and publicly recorded land records, judgments and starter policies--all necessary information for insurance companies that write title insurance.

Although FNF's insurance company subsidiaries will also use Property Insight, Property Insights' services will be used by many other insurance companies. "By combining our title plant operations into a single, stand-alone company, we are focusing our energy on expanding our geographic coverage to become the leading provider of automated information services to the title insurance industry," says Patrick Stone, president of Fidelity National Financial. "At the same time, we will improve the return on investments we make in information technology, strengthening our business and financial performance by leveraging spending across more markets."

By developing a national information service that automates research and delivery of information needed to examine and underwrite title insurance, Property Insight will enable its customers to lower manual research costs, improve turnaround time and consolidate operations to regional and national processing centers, according to Ron Free, vice president, FNF.

Greg MacSweeney is editorial director of InformationWeek Financial Services, whose brands include Wall Street & Technology, Bank Systems & Technology, Advanced Trading, and Insurance & Technology. View Full Bio