Do those two counties have a scanned copy of the deed records?
I took apart a deed book just last week in a South GA courthouse. But, I put it back together afterwards....
It varies.... I've been in a South GA courthouse that used a plat book as a door stop... and had books laying about like this.... with removed pages stacked about...
I've also been in a South GA courthouse that when they saw me removing pages from a deed book, they almost called the law... I spent 2 solid days in that courthouse, so they assigned a clerk to me to make my copies....
Most FL records are online though....
New developments for this part of the state are putting records on line. Most of our county's courthouse records are digital and available from land record room computers. One company has county records on line for $30 a month. Another company is working toward putting the records they have on line. These digital records go back to about 1992, and county personnel scan the older records as time permits. I wish they would also put the plat records on line. For some counties, the sheer volume of records is amazing, and process over eight thousand deeds per year. For others, they may process only about a thousand deeds per year and still keep paper records.
Some counties in Iowa (I don't research enough to know if it's standard across the state) forbid cameras in the offices. They'll make you a copy for a fee, usually not exorbitant.
It varies, but no one I ever saw complained if I imaged a doc. There are some title people who carry hand scanners and this is so much quicker than copies and breaking apart the books.
The photo is exactly how it's done everywhere I go except for the coffee and mess, which is unforgivable. There are some counties using microfilm and of course you are stuck making copies of those.
But what is in those books is not the original, just a copy, the originals are filed away in a vault
In the old days at the large firm, our researcher, Billy Plunkett, was allowed to take the original plats out of the courthouse and bring them back to the office to make prints. Bear in mind that Billy was as reliable as person as you can get. Utterly conscientious and absolutely honest.
One day I asked him if he was through with that roll of drawings he had left on my desk for a week. He was mortified. All original plats that he had forgotten to return.
