Hi Folks
Some of you have probably seen media reports about people who though they owned property but it turned out they didn’t. Obviously this is very rare.
I’ve just bough some land and I am interested in making sure that the conveyancing covered everything it should have but I can’t seem to find any authoritative information about this online.
If anyone knows of a resource like this I’d be very interested to hear about it, cheers.
The land purchase on completion should have been supported by the conveyancer/solicitor providing copies of the property registered title and survey plan. The same should have been included by the agent for the contract for the sale prepared before agreeing to the purchase.
If this source is not trusted.
One place to start is searching for your state/territory government lands and titles office.
EG. Searches - Titles Queensland
The same sites should also point to the respective governments mapping tools where one can reliably identify the block of land from a map as well as a reference (a lot registration number) to use when requesting the search. In Qld I can for our council area get this information from the council or state mapping services.
The site will provide details of how to request a search and receive a copy of the current title with registered owners details.
Note that when you search on line there are also various third party businesses that will take your money and do the same thing for you. Whether that meets trustworthiness or costs less is a personal decision.
Sharing generalised details of which state or territory the purchased land is located in might enable others to offer more specific guidance.
Something standard in some places but not others when one takes out a mortgage is Title Insurance. Not a reference or recommendation, just an example.
One way to be more sure that you have the right block is to get a surveyor to go there and check, they will physically check the location against the position data on the title and give you a certificate. For more money you can get them to check your boundaries also which may reveal encroachment by neighbours.
The way boundaries are marked and maintained will depend on whether the property is suburban or rural. If rural you need to learn about give and take fencing as some encroachment may not be a problem at all.
Another thing you can do just from your chair is get survey details from your State lands authority for a modest fee for the listed Deposited Plan (or other title system in some spots).
You can do a quick and dirty paper validation for nothing if your state has a public facility. For example NSW has the Spatial Information Exchange https://maps.six.nsw.gov.au/ where you can search for your DP and block, or address. You can check this against Google Earth for boundaries etc and also measure the area which for various reasons may not be what the title or estate agent says.
You can also check with specific authorities if they are additional items of value (eg water license) or detriment (eg power line easement) associated with the title.
I am not suggesting that you forego a title search by a conveyancer or solicitor altogether but it is not a bad idea to have as much data as possible before entering into purchase negotiations.
On my rural property the conveyancer said there was a potential problem as the street access was across a river. If true that would have been a huge problem as the river floods! They had misread the plan as the original address of the block before subdivision was over the river but there was in fact road access on the same side. Once purchased it was a simple matter to get the Council to alter the street address to the road where the house would be. So the more data you have beforehand the better position you are in to make sure all the players are accurate and truthful.
Thanks Mark. I’m in Tasmania, cheers.
You can use:
https://maps.thelist.tas.gov.au/listmap/app/list/map
to do basic searches using:
If the land title has been registered, then it will show its location on the LISTmap. One of the background layers is the cadastre. You can match the result with the copy of they survey plan (called folio plan in Tassie) which should be part of the conveyancing package of documents. If you don’t have a survey plan, these are available through Services Tasmania for a fee.
If the land is going through the process of subdivision/reconfiguration and titles are in the process of being registered, you should be able to get a cadastral plan from the surveyor which carried out the survey. If the subdivision/reconfiguration has been lodged with Council for approval prior to registration, Council should have a copy of the cadastral plan. This cadastral plan will show the arrangement of lots post registration of the survey plans.
While one can their own checks for ‘peace of mind’, such searches should not be done to replace the suite of searches carried out through the conveyancing process.
This website provides information on commonly carried out property searches through the conveyancing process…
For a fee a person can conduct a Title search with the Titles office of that State or Territory.
For Tasmania see the following web page
Thanks Phil. Yes definitely worth looking into, cheers.
Thanks very much PH
Thanks G I will keep that in mind, cheers.
