pre-closing liens/back taxes

[Andrew Zavage]

Members of BP,

I'm hoping someone with a previous similar experience or legal education can contribute to this question:

I bought a property in April of 2014. recently (in the past 3 months), I was contacted by the borough/municipality regarding taxes that were owed on the property before it was to be sold to me. I have since paid all the taxes to ensure there are no future liens filed against the property. However, in my HUD-1 statement, there is a $200 charge for "tax cert/lien ltrs", which i assume is shorthand for tax certification and lien letter research. My question is, shouldn't these delinquent taxes, although not composing a lien yet, have been discovered prior to closing? The law firm that has been doing my settlements has been good to me, but I think they dropped the ball on this and I should recoup some of these costs on account of their lack of due diligence. I could be wrong, but would love advice.

thank you!