LIKE most homebuyers, Debra Kling did not pay much attention to title insurance when she and her husband bought a home in Larchmont, N.Y., last year.It was just part of the blizzard of papers they had to sign and the endless checks they had to write at closing.
She and her family moved in and all was well until her neighbor told her that they could not use most of the driveway they had assumed was theirs. Nor could she and her husband, Jeffrey Shaffer, build a basketball court for their 12-year-old son, Ricky, as they had promised they would when they moved from Manhattan.
It turns out that a decision in a 1987 lawsuit gave the neighbor the right to use the driveway - and took away that right from their house - but that was not disclosed by the seller or the real estate company, Ms. Kling said.
Nor did their title insurance company, Fidelity National Title, discover it, she said.
"If we had known this, we wouldn't have bought the house," Ms. Kling said.
