Registered and Unregistered Conveyancing: Title Investigation and Registration
Two systems, one logic
Unregistered conveyancing requires the buyer's solicitor to investigate a good root of title (typically at least 15 years), examine the chain of documents, and check land charges against names at the Land Charges Department. Registered conveyancing substitutes the register: investigate the official copy of the register and title plan, note the class of title (absolute, possessory, qualified, good leasehold), and check the schedule of notices, charges and inhibitions. The register is everything - but not quite: overriding interests, mines and minerals, and transitional interests still matter.
Traps
First registration triggers are heavily examined: transfer for value, gift, assent, mortgage, and long leases. A question may ask what happens to a legal easement on first registration - it becomes overriding if it was legal, in actual use, and known to the purchaser. Watch the difference between a notice and a restriction: a notice protects a third-party right, a restriction controls the circumstances in which a disposition may be registered. Also distinguish a caution against first registration from a unilateral notice. Possessory title is a classic trap: it does not extinguish adverse rights and is not the same as absolute title.
Rule of thumb
For registered land: read the property register, proprietorship register and charges register in that order, then the title plan. For unregistered land: root of title, chain, then land charges search by name.
Worked example
A client buys registered land subject to a lease of 10 years that is not noted on the register. Because it is a legal lease for seven years or less, it overrides; a lease of more than seven years would need protection to bind. Check the term, not the parties' intentions.