Welcome to your daily briefing on real estate developments in Michigan. Today we're covering 5 key stories including updates on michigan real estate headlines, background & context. Let's dive in.
Listen to today's briefing(3:12 min)
2 stories
Bankrate explains that real estate agents are paid through commissions, typically a percentage of the home’s sale price, and breaks down how those commissions work and who pays them.
For MI real estate professionals, this helps frame transparent compensation discussions so clients clearly understand how agent fees are calculated in transaction planning.
Michigan Propertychecker is a Michigan property records search tool that helps users find owner details, permits, purchase history, and deed, tax, loan, and lien records.
For MI real estate professionals, it centralizes key property-record resources in one Michigan-specific place for faster and more efficient research.
Reach real estate professionals in this market
3 stories
Even after a clean title commitment, four issues commonly surface post-close: undisclosed easements (often utility), boundary discrepancies between deed and survey, unreleased mortgages from prior owners, and mechanic's liens filed within the lookback window. Owner's title insurance covers most of these; lender's policy alone does not.
The cost difference between owner's and lender's title insurance is one-time and small; the cost of resolving a title defect without owner's coverage is often five figures.
The most-rejected permit applications fail on documentation completeness, not project merit. A reliable pre-submission check covers four things: (1) parcel zoning matches intended use, (2) setback dimensions match the survey, (3) any required HOA or design-review sign-off is attached, (4) contractor license number is valid and unrestricted in the issuing jurisdiction.
Permit re-submission resets the queue clock in most MI jurisdictions, adding 2-6 weeks to a project. Catching documentation gaps before submission is the cheapest schedule recovery tool an owner has.
Beyond the standard CC&Rs, four documents predict future assessment risk: the reserve study (is the association underfunded?), the most recent two annual budgets, the delinquency report (what % of owners are behind?), and any pending litigation. A reserve-study funding ratio below 30% is a yellow flag; below 10% is red.
Special assessments in underfunded associations routinely run $10K-$50K per unit and arrive with little notice. The reserve study is a legally required disclosure in most states — but most buyers never ask for it.
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