Your mileage may vary.
It depends.
The contrary may be shown.
This is a follow-on to the research procedure thread below. The issue is the difference between a title company researcher doing what they do and a land surveyor doing what needs done. This is based strictly on my experience with about a dozen title insurance offices spread over a number of nearby counties. Your locale and your experiences may be very different.
The title company's function is to follow title issues back from present to some point in the past for a specific, identified property. Most such firms have what they call their plant, which is the sum total of all the knowledge they have assembled inhouse over the many years of existence of that firm or purchased from other firms. As a general rule they have already issued a title policy at some point in the past for the same property. If so, they merely search from present back to that date of issue. They view this as prudent as they have little more risk now than they did X number of years ago. Their interest is based largely on the statistics of the title industry and what types of situation result in them actually making a pay out. An exception occurs when those statistics indicate a need for better information of a certain category. An example of this is a case where a deed was signed by Joe Smith. The abstractor/title person at the time knew that Joe Smith was a single man so did not have another deed or affidavat filed to clarify that Joe Smith was a single man, thus assuring he had the full right deed away all interest. Years later, the title industry had encountered too many problems of this sort and insisted that their workers clear up such issues.
Title company workers do not normally worry about the actual boundaries of the tract and any physical intrusions across said boundaries. This arises only if the client is willing to pay extra for survey coverage. Enter the surveyors and all they do to prevent the rapid closing of the subject transaction. Besides, the survey coverage added to the policy is not based on true potential damages. It is more of a catchall whose risk is based on the statistics of title company payouts.
Meanwhile, the surveyor's need for deed/boundary information has nothing to do with title company risk/payouts. It is focused on determining rights; those rights contained within the bundle of rights being transferred with the tract to be surveyed. Normally, we think of those rights as following the physical location of the boundaries we find, determine or create. A huge difference is that it is incumbent on the surveyor to also look at the adjoiners' rights to search for gaps, overlaps, easements of varying types, rights-of-way, physical intrusions across boundaries, differing wording on descriptions for what is intended to be the same boundary and numerous other potential conflicting interests. The title worker has no interest in adjoiners and their rights as they are not being paid to do that. The title worker envisions no difference between descriptions that read as follows: The south 50 feet of Lot 7 is Owner A while Owner B's deed says The North three-fourths of Lot 7 where Lot 7 measures 214 feet instead of the platted 200 feet. Whether working for Owner A or Owner B, the title company worker is only concerned with the one tract for which they are being paid and, thus, generally have no knowledge of the problem as identified by the surveyor.
I happen to work in an area where it is fairly simple to enter the Register of Deeds office and research the entire recorded history of a tract and it's adjoiners. We have the index books available to all. The various books of deeds, mortgages and miscellaneous information are all in the same large vault dating to the founding of the county. I recognize that this is a direct reversal of other jurisdictions where the abstract/title industry dominates and has the indexes. The county function is largely one of book storage. My personal opinion is that this is absolutely wrong and unAmerican.
I agree, digger.
About five or six years ago a lot of the Registrar of Deeds (County Clerk's Office) around Oklahoma started requiring anyone wanting to look through the books to sign an affidavit swearing that you "were not performing abstracting".
I went ahead and signed it. Although no charge for the form, it had to be notorized. Wound up running it down three flights of stairs to get "Marlene" in the Sheriff's Office to notorize the darn thing.
I had one County Clerk balk when I failed to fill out the line "Your Company's Name".
Ain't none of theirdamnbusiness. I told them I just like to read Deed Records. I agree that the Abstract/ Title Company's act like they own all the County's records.
McClain County, Oklahoma, has two new copy machines in the Deed Office. Bigass sign says "For Abstract Company Use Only." The rest of us have to fill out a request form and sit and wait for Gladys to finish a coffee break (with Marlene, from the Sheriff's Office, remember?) and run the copies.
The only saving grace is that more and more of the Counties are getting the stuff on-line.
>About five or six years ago a lot of the Registrar of Deeds (County Clerk's Office) around Oklahoma started requiring anyone wanting to look through the books to sign an affidavit swearing that you "were not performing abstracting".
That's odd. How could the Clerk prevent abstracting? It seems that that is a normal purpose for those records.
Abstracting in Oklahoma is very different...
It is a "good ol' boy" business that was successful in getting legislation passed to eliminate competition. To obtain your "Abstractor's" license..you have to have access to an Abstract Plant (separate from the County Records).
I could expound a bit more, but I stumbled onto a web page that basically explains it in detail:
Abstracting in Oklahoma is very different...
Hell really will have to freeze over before title registration ever happens with that kind of legislative corruption enacted!
If I understand right, Iowa uses abstracting and doesn't allow title insurance. Geez, to have to pay for the abstract covered with E&O and then also be required to get title insurance is really a double whack. So what do the title insurance folks do with all the free money and no risk?
Bet there is a lot of cash land sales there without any of this, or do they have that sown up also?
It's pretty much still a free country..
..money talks and b.s. walks. Cash sales can usurp all the parasitic hoo-for-awe that generally surrounds real estate deals. But one would need to do a little homework before plunkin' down a wad-o-cash.
If any lending institution is involved, title commitment and abstracting is required.
Oklahoma also has some laws that state "caveat emptor". Let the buyer beware is the Latin translation. In my mind it says "beware of body-putty." These laws place the burden of any warranty on the buyer. Lot's of crooks in Oklahoma, they all seem to congregate at the State Capitol.
It's pretty much still a free country..
These laws place the burden of any warranty on the buyer.
Not sure I understand. Doesn't the grantor warrant title via a warranty deed.
Had an attorney about twenty years ago tell me to NEVER EVER sign a warranty deed. Besides, shouldn't the title insurance be good for something. The title companies always push for a warranty deed (removes more risk from them). Great business title insurance, selling risk insurance when just about all risk has been eliminated.
I think for loans the title insurance requirement is about universal.
Luckily we don't have the abstracter thing here. What we had until a few years ago was the virtual monopoly on making copies at the recorder's office a $2 per page, no self service allowed. My response was to bring in a camera and make my own copies that way.
That caused some heartburn in some recorder's offices where I was told that I was not supporting the coffee or recorder's annual picnic fund. I was never actually refused.
Luckily the state legislature got their hands around the necks of the recorders and required them to have self service copy machine available to the public at the actual cost of the copies.
Suddenly the two dollar per page stuff dropped to as little as five cents in many counties.
The camera thing has seemingly blown over too. I had to get some records from the 1830's in one county and the camera got me far better and usable images of the original pen work than the scans the county had online. The recorder and staff were completely cooperative.
My home county recorder won't allow copies or pictures of the abstract books. Everything else is OK, you can copy you own at 0.25 per page. Nothing is online with no plans to do so. They will email stuff if you have a prepaid account. I get a lot of plats and stuff that way.
If you want to do any abstracting you go and make notes from the books in the office. Since about 1993 it's on the computer (in the office) so you must go to the office to get it. It kind of sucks. Every county in Utah is different. Some has all online and it varies from there. Utah County is all free online. Salt Lake County has it all in the computer but requires a monthly fee for access. Some of the rural counties will let you take pictures and some won't.
I'm sure I could push the issue but that would just poison the well, so to speak.
One county had an election were the challenger's issue was to open up the office and get it online. The guy lost by just a few votes so nothing changed.
LR
Sure, if you can get a warranty deed. It was misleading of me to say that it places the burden of warranty on the buyer.
Here's an example of what I meant:
Fella calls me up and wants a lot he just bought surveyed. Lot 9, Hidden Hole Addition. He faxes me a small copy of the plat. I tell him I'll meet him out there.
I get to the turn-in to the 'rural subdivision' and count down to somewhere near Lot 9...and wait. I also notice all the area around Lot 9 is pretty much swamp. After about twenty minutes this guy shows up and wants to know what I'm doing "down here"?
Seems as though the 'salesman' showed and sold him a beautiful lot up the hill with a natural landing for a house site and a bucolic view of the valley.
We shot a distance up to the black-top and I showed him on the plat that Lot 9 had to be down here in the swamp, not up by the beautiful lot he thought he bought. He was flabberghasted and fired me on the spot. Said he needed a surveyor that knew how to find his land. Fine. See you later.
I checked later and sure enough, he bought Lot 9, not Lot 3 or 4. He got took. I bet that guy selling lots showed everybody the pretty lot and screwed them on the contract. Not a thing anybody could do. It's up to the buyer in Oklahoma to satisfy themselves as to validity and location of the property.
PS - I wouldn't convey any property with a warranty deed without some sort of title insurance though. Lots of cash sales in Oklahoma get recorded with QC Deeds.
LR
It's kind of sad what a lot of the public knows about boundary's. I moved out of the urban area back to the farm about 5 years ago and don't do that many lot's any more. Never liked doing them. I used to get calls from folks that had just bought homes in a new subdivision wanting me to come and survey the lot and show them the boundaries. Many of them didn't know the lots were surveyed and didn't have a clue there were markers there (I suppose they never thought to ask where the boundaries were). I'd ask them if they had seen any markers and give them a description of what they should look for. If that didn't cure the problem as soon as they found out what the charges would be that seemed to cure the need for a survey. A few times I did go out and usually I'd be able to locate the corners under a few inches of dirt.
Then there are the ones that just split the distance between their house and the next one and...................
Like I mentioned, I don't like doing normal residential lots. They can rarely afford the services of a land surveyor and these folks do all kinds of dumb stuff.
Abstracting in Oklahoma is very different...
That's really bizarre and enlightening. Like the article points out, it seems like the system created a monopoly in some areas since a requirement to doing business in a certain county appears to be that you have to have an established "title plant" within the county. I don't see how a new business could open under those requirements.
So, is the reason why the clerk requires the sworn affidavit because they view anyone attempting to abstract from the public records (instead of a "title plant") as breaking the law?
This is an interesting topic. Very different from what I'm used to.
Maybe a dumb question, but who owns the "abstract books"? Are they compiled by the clerk's office (i.e., public records paid for by the tax payers?). Or were they compiled by the title companies and the clerk just keeps a copy (i.e., it's copyrighted material?)
The abstract books are in the county recorders office. They are a running record of conveyances. They all started out in one book and then gradually split out into townships and then to sections. So you can abstract title by following the names and descriptions either back of forward. I works pretty good. Then from the abstract books you can get the book, page and entry number, pull the book off the shelf and copy the document. I'd think this is quite common, but its the only way I've done it. We also have grantor/grantee indexes but I rarely ever need to use them.
I'm pretty sure that If I wanted to push the subject via the law they'd have to let me copy or photograph the books. I get along good with the recorders office and just don't want to force the issue. The books are large and it would need to be done on the big scanner though at two to four dollars per page. Of course the photos would only be my time.
Ok, I see. Here, we just have grantor/grantee indexes, as far as I know. It seems odd that you are not allowed the copy or photograph a public record, but I guess it might be a matter of not having suitable equipment readily available. I remember a company used to make a scanning wand where you could slide it across the page and it would scan the document. But I do understand that keeping a good relationship with the office is important, too.
Grantor/Grantee Indexes are better than nothing
But not by much.
Case in point. I was trying to find the deed for the tract owned by my great-grandparents who lived in Missouri from their marriage in the 1870's to the mid-1920's. Apparently they purchased their farm on a contract for deed type of deal so the deed was not filed until nearly 20 years after their moving there. That meant looking through the non-alphabetical "C" listings in the Grantor/Grantee indexes for a 20 year stretch until finally finding it. This was necessary despite knowing within about a 2 mile radius as to where they were located. In my home area I could have scanned the indexes by section/township/range for that entire area in under ten minutes to find their deed. Missouri is one of the States where the abstractors have a stranglehold on the indexes by location.
