I close a lot of real estate transactions in South Florida. And after years of doing this work in Broward County and the surrounding markets, I can tell you that the experience of buying property here is genuinely different from what most buyers expect — even experienced investors.

This isn’t a general “how to buy a house” article. This is what actually matters in South Florida in 2026, from a closing attorney’s chair.

Title Issues Are Your First Problem

South Florida has a rich and complicated ownership history — decades of rapid development, multiple boom-and-bust cycles, distressed sales, and foreclosures. Title issues here are more common than in most U.S. markets. The ones I see most often:

• Open permits: A prior owner pulled a permit for a renovation and never closed it. The property has an open permit sitting on record, which means the county considers that work incomplete or uninspected. Lenders won’t close on a property with open permits, and buyers inherit the problem unless it’s resolved before closing. In Broward County especially, open permit searches need to go back 20+ years.
• Unreleased liens: Old mortgages that were paid off but never properly discharged from the public record. Municipal liens from code violations — overgrown grass, unpermitted structures, failed inspections — that the seller never resolved. These attach to the property, not the person.
• IITF reservations: The Internal Improvement Trust Fund reserved certain waterfront and tidal property rights decades ago. If your property touches water in Florida, your title search needs to specifically address IITF reservations, which can limit your use and ownership rights in ways that aren’t obvious on the surface.

Surveys: Don’t Skip Them, Don’t Accept Stale Ones

Florida buyers frequently accept surveys that are 5, 10, or even 15 years old. That’s a mistake. Encroachments, fences, additions, and easements that didn’t exist in 2012 absolutely exist now. I’ve seen surveys reveal that a neighbor’s addition encroaches 18 inches onto the property, a situation that created months of delay and nearly killed the deal.

Get a current survey. It costs $400–$900 for most residential and small commercial properties. It’s one of the best dollars you spend in a real estate transaction.

Estoppels in Condo and HOA Transactions

If you’re buying a condo or property in an HOA, you need an estoppel certificate from the association. This document confirms the current fees, any outstanding balances owed by the seller, pending special assessments, and any violations on record. Florida law (§720.30851 for HOAs; §718.116 for condos) gives associations 10 days to respond, but processing fees can be significant.

What buyers miss: the estoppel reflects the status as of a specific date. If closing is delayed, the estoppel may expire and need to be refreshed — at additional cost and with a new time window. Build this into your closing timeline.

South Florida Insurance: The New Deal-Killer

Florida’s property insurance market has been in crisis, and 2026 hasn’t fully resolved it. For buyers, this creates real transactional risk:

• Some properties are uninsurable at reasonable rates because of roof age, prior claims history, or coastal location
• Lenders require insurance before closing — if you can’t get it, the deal dies
• Citizens Property Insurance (the state’s insurer of last resort) has increasing restrictions on what it will cover and has raised rates significantly

What to do: Get insurance quotes during your inspection period, not after. If the property can’t be insured at a viable rate, you need to know before you’re past your inspection contingency deadline.

The AI Layer: Can Software Replace a Closing Attorney?

This question comes up constantly in 2026. The short answer is no — and here’s why it matters specifically in South Florida.

AI-powered title and closing platforms can automate document preparation, run basic title searches, and flag common issues. They’re genuinely useful for straightforward transactions in stable markets with clean title histories.

South Florida is not that market. The combination of complex title histories, aggressive municipal lien practices, active HOA and condo association environments, and Florida-specific statutes that interact in non-obvious ways means that automated systems regularly miss things that cost buyers money. I’ve personally reviewed transactions that cleared automated title review and contained open permits, unresolved IITF reservations, and stale estoppels — all in the same file.

Technology makes the process faster. It doesn’t make it safer to skip professional review.

What to Actually Focus On in 2026

The South Florida market in 2026 is more normalized than the pandemic peak, but still competitive for desirable properties. The transactions that go smoothly are the ones where buyers engage their attorney early — before contract signing, not after — and where the title, survey, insurance, and municipal lien search are treated as priorities, not afterthoughts.

If you’re buying property in Broward County or South Florida, contact Richard Rosa Law. We handle residential and commercial closings throughout the region and can help you navigate the issues that actually kill South Florida deals.