Transfer of Title and Title Records
The deed
A valid deed requires a competent grantor, a named grantee, words of conveyance, a legal description, consideration, and the grantor's signature. Notarization is needed for recording, not for validity. Delivery with intent plus acceptance completes the transfer; recording protects the interest but does not create title.
Deed types
General warranty: six covenants, present and future. Special warranty: warranty limited to defects arising during the grantor's ownership. Bargain and sale: implies no warranties but suggests the grantor holds title. Quitclaim: conveys whatever interest the grantor has, with no promises at all - valid, merely risky.
Recording and priority
Recording statutes allocate priority among competing interests: race (first to record wins), notice (first without notice wins), and race-notice (first to record without notice wins). Notice may be actual, constructive (recorded documents), or inquiry (facts that should prompt investigation). A deed recorded outside the chain may not give constructive notice. Title insurance protects the lender under a lender's policy and the owner under an owner's policy; South Dakota practice has traditionally relied on an abstract of title with an attorney's opinion, frequently accompanied by title insurance.
Other transfers
Adverse possession, prescription, dedication, condemnation, escheat, foreclosure, tax deeds, and probate or intestacy all move title without a purchase.
Traps
- A quitclaim from someone with no interest conveys nothing.
- The grantee does not sign the deed.
- A cloud on title is cleared by a quiet title action.
- Marketable title is title free of reasonable objection - not the same as an abstract.
Rule of thumb
Ask who promised what: general warranty promises everything, special warranty promises only the grantor's own acts, quitclaim promises nothing.
Worked example
Seller gives Buyer a quitclaim deed, and a prior grantee later produces a validly recorded earlier deed. Buyer owns nothing as against that prior grantee and has no warranty claim against Seller, because the quitclaim conveyed only what Seller actually held.