Stewart Title in Everett on fire

Jillayne Schlicke on 06 25, 2008

I just received a call from Mark Perez who works at Stewart Title in King County telling me that Northwest Cable News is showing film footage of a fire in progress at Stewart Title’s Snohomish County main office in Everett. 

If you recall it was less than a year ago that Stewart Title Everett received a two million dollar fine by the state Insurance Commissioner for violating provisions of state law governing title insurance companies.

Update: Here are some links to follow up stories on the fire:

The Everett Herald

Seattle PI 911 Police Blog

Seattle Times says ATF is investigating

KIRO TV reports that ATF says the fire does not look suspicious.  video

About the Author: Jillayne Schlicke

Jillayne Schlicke researches, writes, and instructs continuing education courses, convention workshops and keynote presentations for the real estate and mortgage industries on a wide variety of topics as CEO of CE Forward, Inc. Jillayne is also the Founder and Executive Director for The National Association of Mortgage Fiduciaries, which serves the mortgage lending industry by raising ethical standards, creating a framework for industry self regulation, providing continuing education classes, and helping the industry prepare for the emergence of fiduciary duties. Jillayne received an M.A. in Psych from Antioch University in Seattle where she studied moral psychology, philosophy, and business ethics and received a B.S. in Business and Systems from the University of Phoenix. Jillayne presents hundreds of classes and workshops each year, has published numerous articles for various publications, is a contributing author and editor on Rain City Guide, has been appointed to 38 professional association chair positions or committees and has received 13 industry awards including "2008 Instructor of the Year" from the Seattle King County Association of Realtors. Contact Jillayne at 206-931-2241 Read Jillayne's stuff on Rain City Guide...

10 Responses to “Stewart Title in Everett on fire”

  1. Kary L. Krismer
    June 26, 2008 at 9:03 am

    Are you suggesting that the Insurance Commissioner torched the place? ;)

    Reply
    #320390
  2. biliruben
    June 26, 2008 at 10:38 am

    Is this a repository for important docs?

    Are you suggesting this is a two-fer fire? Collect on the fire insurance and also go bankrupt to avoid paying the fine?

    The obviously had the ethics to do it.

    Reply
    #320408
  3. Rhonda Porter
    June 26, 2008 at 12:59 pm

    I believe that they just merged offices to this site? What a mess! The news said last night that flames were shooting 30 feet high in the air.

    Reply
    #320419
  4. Toby Barnett
    June 26, 2008 at 1:35 pm

    That sucks! When things could not get any worse for Stewart Title they did :(

    Reply
    #320421
  5. Greg Perry
    June 26, 2008 at 1:50 pm

    biliruben,
    If you’ve never toured a title plant, you have no idea. You’ll never see so much paper.

    I would think there were few important docs that don’t exist elsewhere (like another title plant for a different company.)

    Reply
    #320423
  6. Rhonda Porter
    June 26, 2008 at 3:08 pm

    Greg, there’s also a lot of micro-film, reel to reels…and since I’m sure they did escrow and (I assuming) prepared recordings, think about the transaction/documents (original deeds, deeds of trusts) that are now MIA.

    Reply
    #320432
  7. Tim
    June 26, 2008 at 3:52 pm

    Rhonda,

    Bingo with the originals laying around. That is exactly what we were thinking this morning. On the way out the door this morning Lynn and I were discussing back up protocols for data and everything else–storage off site.

    I just came back from dropping by the building after doing some errands and the Fire Marshall and ATF were milling around.

    Reply
    #320436
  8. Greg Perry
    June 26, 2008 at 4:01 pm

    Oh my…forgot about the escrow end.

    Reply
    #320438
  9. Rhonda Porter
    June 26, 2008 at 4:58 pm

    It’s going to impact many transactions. Hopefully everyone cooperates with getting re-signed.

    Reply
    #320444
  10. Jillayne Schlicke
    June 26, 2008 at 5:02 pm

    If anyone needs to reach Stewart due to a transaction in process, I have heard that Stewart Everett staff is working out of their Bothell and SeaTac offices.

    Bothell: 425-205-4500
    SeaTac: 206-770-8700

    Reply
    #320445

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