Stewart Expands Property Valuation Solutions Through Acquisition of Pro Teck Valuation Intelligence

HOUSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Stewart Appraisals Management, Inc., a subsidiary of Stewart Information Services Corporation (NYSE:STC), announced today its acquisition of Pro-Teck Services Ltd., DBA Pro Teck Valuation Intelligence, strengthening and expanding its scale in appraisal and valuation solutions. With more than 40 years of residential real estate experience, Pro Teck is an industry leader in property valuation services, including their proprietary technology Valuation Intelligence^TM, a cloud-based fulfillment platform that provides the best residential real estate values and market information, as well as a SaaS solution to enable lenders to directly manage the appraisal process in-house.

“As we continue to invest in Stewart’s future, this acquisition adds innovative technology, data and analytics to our growing valuation businesses, critical for driving future business,” said Stewart CEO Fred Eppinger. “Pro Teck’s added scale and capabilities takes us one step closer to becoming the Premier Title Services Company, allowing us to increase our services for our customers.”

“Pro Teck’s breadth of services strengthens our ability to provide a great customer experience,” said Aaron Fowler, Senior Vice President at Stewart. “Our team is excited to work with our new colleagues and eager to begin collaborating with the entire Pro Teck team as we build the premier player in our industry.”

Pro Teck provides customers with accurate and timely real estate information through a transparent process, exceeding industry standards in a complex regulatory environment. Pro Teck’s Valuation Intelligence^TM platform enables a single source of property valuations for mortgage originators, servicers and investors. Combining the best of market data and human insight, Pro Teck delivers a comprehensive suite of products including appraisals, desktop appraisals, BPOs, desktop reviews, AVMs, data/analytics and hybrid solutions.

“We are very excited to become part of the Stewart family,” said Tom O’Grady, CEO of Pro Teck Valuation Intelligence. “Stewart’s commitment to building their appraisal and valuation capabilities into a dominant market leader was attractive to us. With the strength of Stewart, and the synergies with Stewart’s existing appraisal and valuation operations, we will be able to bring much greater value and competitive advantage to our clients.”

In June, Stewart acquired United States Appraisals, a move that strengthened its offerings in Mortgage Originations. By adding Pro Teck’s expertise in Capital Markets and Servicing, and additional scale in Origination Appraisals, Stewart has solidified itself as a national leader in title insurance, settlement services, appraisal/valuation, and other real estate services for lenders, consumer banks, servicers, investors and other mortgage industry partners.

Berkery Noyes served as exclusive financial advisor to Pro Teck Valuation Intelligence.

About Stewart

Stewart (NYSE-STC) is a global real estate services company, offering products and services through our direct operations, network of Stewart Trusted Providers™ and family of companies. From residential and commercial title insurance and closing and settlement services to specialized offerings for the mortgage industry, we offer the comprehensive service, deep expertise and solutions our customers need for any real estate transaction. At Stewart, we are dedicated to becoming the premier title services company and we are committed to doing so by partnering with our customers to create mutual success. Learn more at stewart.com.

Forward-looking statements. Certain statements in this news release are "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such forward-looking statements relate to future, not past, events and often address our expected future business and financial performance. These statements often contain words such as "expect," "anticipate," "intend," "plan," "believe," "seek," "will," "foresee" or other similar words. Forward-looking statements by their nature are subject to various risks and uncertainties that could cause our actual results to be materially different than those expressed in the forward-looking statements. These risks and uncertainties include, among other things, the volatility of economic conditions, including the timing and effects of the COVID-19 pandemic; adverse changes in the level of real estate activity; changes in mortgage interest rates, existing and new home sales, and availability of mortgage financing; our ability to respond to and implement technology changes, including the completion of the implementation of our enterprise systems; the impact of unanticipated title losses or the need to strengthen our policy loss reserves; any effect of title losses on our cash flows and financial condition; the ability to attract and retain highly productive sales associates; the impact of vetting our agency operations for quality and profitability; independent agency remittance rates; changes to the participants in the secondary mortgage market and the rate of refinancing that affects the demand for title insurance products; regulatory non-compliance, fraud or defalcations by our title insurance agencies or employees; our ability to timely and cost-effectively respond to significant industry changes and introduce new products and services; the outcome of pending litigation; the impact of changes in governmental and insurance regulations, including any future reductions in the pricing of title insurance products and services; our dependence on our operating subsidiaries as a source of cash flow; our ability to access the equity and debt financing markets when and if needed; our ability to grow our international operations; seasonality and weather; and our ability to respond to the actions of our competitors. These risks and uncertainties, as well as others, are discussed in more detail in our documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2019, and if applicable, our Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, and our Current Reports on Form 8-K. All forward-looking statements included in this news release are expressly qualified in their entirety by such cautionary statements. We expressly disclaim any obligation to update, amend or clarify any forward-looking statements contained in this news release to reflect events or circumstances that may arise after the date hereof, except as may be required by applicable law.