By: Deborah Johnson Wood
One probably doesn’t expect a title insurance company to hold many patents. But Grand Rapids-based Sun Title’s approach to business revolves around innovation, and some of those innovations have led to several patents pending for this creative company.
“We have only one brick and mortar location in Michigan,” says Tom Cronkright, co-owner with Lawrence Duthler. “So we created five mobile title offices, sleek vans equipped with technology that we bring to our clients in real time. We can do anything in the mobile units that we can do back at the office.”
The pending patents are on the technology, the business method, and the security protocols of the mobile units, which allow Sun to service a 70-mile radius of the Grand Rapids office, located at 1410 Plainfield NE, without having the cost of brick and mortar offices. Of Sun’s $500 million in real estate closings, the company closes over half of them using the mobile units.
Keeping costs down enabled Sun to weather the subprime meltdown last year with minimal reorganization resulting in the loss of two jobs. The company experienced a quick recovery—Sun restored the jobs in January, plus added a new operations manager, Tracie McRae.
“Tracie is in the process of restructuring our productions department so we’ll be able to deliver consistently on very short turnaround times,” says Cronkright. “Bringing her on is like bringing Michael Jordan on the team.”
By July, Cronkright expects to be in position to add additional jobs, estimating he’ll create five examination department and escrow department positions by year’s end.
“We’re licensed in five states with an office and mobile unit in Jacksonville, Florida,” Cronkright says. “We plan to take this nationwide.”
Source: Tom Cronkright, Sun Title
Deborah Johnson Wood is the development news editor for Rapid Growth Media. She can be contacted at [email protected].
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