We are a very small bank and have done most of our closings in house as the settlement agent. However, we occasionally have a request to use a title company as a settlement agent. When this happens, we charge a wire fee to wire the funds to the title company. Today, a Realtor is telling us that no other lenders charge wire fees to send wires to the title company and in all his agency's years of experience, they have never seen a wire fee charged to send the funds to a title company. In fact, the Realtor is so adamant that he is offering to personally pay for the wire fee b/c he doesn't believe the buyer or seller should have to pay the fee.

My question to you, BOL, do you charge a wire fee to wire money to the title company for the closing?

Some do and some do not - totally up to you. If it is not your requirement to use a settlement agent, I would think you are free to charge them anything you want too. Many lender that requires the use of a settlement agent would not charge, as it is lender preference.

You are providing a service and a convenience; I see no reason why you shouldn't be able to charge a reasonable fee.

we charge the originator of a wire if it is originated through us, and we charge the receiver of the wire if their account is with us.

I only have one customer we do not charge a wire fee. A large business who does 10+ a month. There may be the rare exception here and there, but not often. I've never had an issue with real estate wires being charged the fee. We only charge outgoing a fee.

I've seen many title companies charge their customers the wire fee and the bank waives their wire fee. I see no reason why the bank can't charge a fee.
When I've closed on a couple of homes the title company charged me a wire fee.

Totally a business decision as discussed above. If you are charging the title company for a wire fee to disburse your own loan funds to the title company, I find that pretty counterproductive. If the title company is using the bank to wire funds for payoffs, etc. associated with the settlement of the transaction, then I would think that you would charge your normal wire fees that are usually charged to any other business. Giving free services to the settlement service provider has some Section 8 risks. Whether the title company passes those fees on to the borrower, that is their business decision.

"Today, a Realtor is telling us that no other lenders charge wire fees to send wires to the title company and in all his agency's years of experience, they have never seen a wire fee charged to send the funds to a title company."

I find that (almost) impossible to believe.