Certificate of Title and Registered Interests in Land

In most of Australia there is no longer such a thing as a certificate of title you can hold in your hand. The paper document has been retired state by state, and what remains is the Register: an electronic record maintained by each land registry, from which anyone who pays the fee can draw a search. For a property developer this is the useful part, because the thing that constrains a site was never the piece of paper. It was the list of registered interests sitting behind it, and those have not gone anywhere.

Before considering a site on the strength of a title search, you’ll need professional advice from a property lawyer. Reading a title is not the same as advising on it. A registered easement either does or does not permit a basement over it, a restrictive covenant either does or does not survive your development application, and whether a given interest can be released, modified or worked around is a legal question with a legal answer that turns on the exact wording of the registered instrument. The consequences land on you, not on the person who drew the search: an unresolved covenant can strand a site after exchange, an undischarged mortgage can stop a plan of subdivision from registering on the day you needed it, and a short unregistered tenancy can push a demolition date past a finance expiry. This guide is written so you can read a title properly and go into that conversation knowing what to ask. It is not a substitute for the conversation, and there is a what-to-ask section near the end built for exactly that purpose.

Rules, forms and registry practice in this area change, and several of the changes described below are recent. Figures, dates and section references here were current at the date of writing, and the linked primary source in each case is where to confirm the position before relying on it.

What is a certificate of title in Australia now?

In most states, the certificate of title is now the Register itself rather than a document. The registries have been explicit about this. The New South Wales Registrar General, announcing the change that took effect on 11 October 2021, stated that from cessation day all current certificates of title would have no legal effect and the Registrar General would no longer issue them for any reason, and that the Torrens Title Register “remains and has always been the single source of truth as to a person’s ownership or interest in land” (NSW Registrar General). Titles Queensland puts the same point more plainly: “It is the Register itself and the information contained therein which proves ownership and establishes indefeasibility of a registered proprietor’s title” (Titles Queensland).

What a developer orders, then, is a search of the Register. Depending on the state it may be called a title search, a register search statement, a record of certificate of title, a folio or a record of title. The naming differs; the function does not. Each is a point-in-time extract showing who is registered as proprietor, how the parcel is described, and every interest recorded against it.

That last word matters. The search shows what is recorded. A great deal that affects a development site is not recorded on title at all, and the second half of this guide deals with that gap, because it is where most feasibility surprises come from.

Which jurisdictions have retired the paper certificate of title?

The short answer is that paper certificates have been retired in New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria and Western Australia, and the position in the remaining jurisdictions is that the Register, not a document, is the operative record. The detail varies enough to matter if you are chasing a title from an elderly vendor or an estate.

New South Wales

Certificates of title were abolished on 11 October 2021, declared “cessation day”. From that date existing certificates ceased to have legal effect and the Registrar General stopped issuing them. The same change took New South Wales to fully electronic dealings, with paper dealings no longer accepted and lodgement running through an Electronic Lodgment Network Operator (NSW Registrar General).

For a developer the practical effect is that nobody needs to produce a title at settlement, and a vendor who cannot find theirs is no longer a problem. The flipside is that the register search is now the only record, so the currency of the search you are relying on is the whole of your protection.

Victoria

Victoria moved later and in two steps. Land Use Victoria’s bulletin records that “from 3 August 2024, all new Victorian certificates of title from the Register of land will be electronic”, and that “existing paper certificates of title will remain valid until they are next required for a conveyancing transaction” (Land Use Victoria).

So Victoria is the jurisdiction where a paper title may still be in play. On a site that has not transacted in some years, the paper certificate may still exist and may still need to be produced and converted. That is a timing item for a lawyer rather than a risk as such, but it belongs on a settlement critical path rather than being discovered in the week of settlement.

Land Use Victoria’s own glossary is a useful reference point for the vocabulary on a Victorian title. It defines an encumbrance as “an interest in a piece of land by someone other than the registered owner”, and notes that encumbrances “place limitations on a property” (Land Use Victoria glossary).

Queensland

Titles Queensland has stopped issuing paper certificates of title, following an amendment to the Land Title Act 1994 (Qld) made by the Land, Explosives and Other Legislation Amendment Act 2019 (Qld). Its customer information says the abolition “does not impact indefeasibility”, and that paper certificates “have not been needed in Queensland since 1994 when the land registry was computerised”. The current and historical title information generated by a search of the Automated Titles System is described as “the authoritative source of current and historical title information, as it has been since 1994” (Titles Queensland).

Western Australia

Western Australia abolished duplicate certificates of title on 7 August 2023, under the Transfer of Land Amendment Act 2022 (WA). Landgate records that duplicate titles “have been removed from WA’s land titling system and will no longer be created or issued”, and that “any Duplicate Titles which are in existence will no longer have any legal effect” (Landgate).

Western Australia kept slightly different language from the eastern states. Landgate describes the Original Certificate of Title, held digitally within the Land Title Register, as providing “the complete legal evidence of your property’s current ownership in Western Australia”, with a Record of Certificate of Title available as a copy of the current information (Landgate). If you are reading a Western Australian title for the first time, that is the document you are looking at.

South Australia

South Australia’s register remains the Register Book under the Real Property Act 1886 (SA), and it is an open register. Land Services SA describes it as “a comprehensive, publicly accessible record that documents the ownership and any legal interests or encumbrances tied to a property”, containing “the names and addresses of registered proprietors, as well as details of property transfers, mortgages, or encumbrances”. It points to section 65 of that Act as the source of the obligation to make the Register Book publicly available for inspection and search (Land Services SA).

For a developer assembling a site quietly, the open-register point cuts both ways. Your own registered dealings are searchable by anyone, including a competing bidder watching a parcel.

Tasmania

Tasmania’s position is stated squarely in the legislation. The Land Titles Office records that the Register maintained by the Recorder of Titles under section 33 of the Land Titles Act 1980 “is and has always been conclusive evidence of estates or interests in land for Tasmania”, and that under section 33(4) the Register comprises “(a) the folios of the Register; (b) the dealings registered under this Act and any of the Acts specified in Schedule 2; and (c) schemes under the Strata Titles Act 1998” (Land Titles Office Tasmania).

Tasmania also gives the clearest published description of what a folio search actually returns. The Land Titles Office lists the folio text as containing the title number as a volume and folio reference, the description of land, “current owner’s names and tenancies held”, “any registered easements, mortgages, covenants, encumbrances, caveats, etc.”, and a “list of any unregistered dealings” (Land Titles Office Tasmania). That last line is worth noting: a list of dealings lodged but not yet registered is itself a signal, and on a site under contract it may be the first indication that somebody else has lodged something.

Northern Territory

The Northern Territory Land Titles Office describes a title search as showing “the property’s current owners, as well as any mortgages or encumbrances”, with registered dealings including “mortgages, covenants, discharges and transfer of property ownership”, searchable by street address, property parcel, volume, folio or dealing number (NT Land Titles Office).

Australian Capital Territory

The Australian Capital Territory is the genuine outlier, because almost all land there is held under a Crown lease rather than freehold. Reading the title is only half the job; the lease purpose clause is the other half, and it controls use and development rights directly rather than through a planning instrument alone.

The ACT government notes that lease variations can “vary the lease purpose to permit additional or alternative uses” and can adjust “development rights and obligations, like increasing your gross floor area (GFA)”, that “all variations depend on Territory Plan requirements”, and that a development application is the vehicle for varying a Crown lease, supported by “a valuation report and valuation certificate”. It also records the building and development provisions that can attach from the start of a lease: to “commence construction on your land within 12 months” or “complete construction on your land within 24 months”, or both (ACT Planning).

Those two periods are the ones that tend to catch developers who are used to freehold jurisdictions. A build commencement obligation running from lease commencement is a hard date sitting on the title document itself, and it may not align with how long a development application and a construction facility actually take.

New Zealand

New Zealand retired the term “certificate of title” some time ago. Land Information New Zealand describes a record of title as a document that “records the legal owners of land and every instrument affecting the land that have been registered under the Land Transfer Act 2017”, and traces the lineage: certificates of title, converted to electronic computer registers between 1999 and 2002, then renamed records of title from November 2018. Records of title are held electronically in Landonline, and may show mortgages, easements, leases, caveats, covenants, restrictions, transfers and other interests (Land Information New Zealand).

If you are working across the Tasman, a vendor or agent still saying “certificate of title” is using a term that has not described the current record for several years, which is sometimes a sign of how recently the parcel last moved.

What does a title search actually show, line by line?

A title search answers four questions: what the parcel is, who owns it, what secures against it, and what burdens it. Each of those lines has a feasibility consequence, and the useful habit is to read a title with a cost, a yield or a date attached to each entry rather than as a legal document to be filed.

The land description, and why the area on title is not the site area

The description identifies the parcel by lot and plan: a deposited plan in New South Wales, a plan of subdivision in Victoria, a survey plan in Queensland, a plan or diagram in Western Australia. Land Use Victoria describes a plan of subdivision as “a plan that depicts the break-up of a piece of land, showing parcels of land, commonly called ‘lots’, that can be sold separately” (Land Use Victoria glossary).

The area shown is the registered area. It is generally not the area you should be multiplying by a floor space ratio or a plot ratio. Road widening that has been resumed but not yet reflected, a strip dedicated on an earlier subdivision, or an older plan drawn before modern survey standards can each produce a gap between the registered area and the surveyed area. A current identification survey is the only thing that closes it, which is why the survey tends to belong in due diligence rather than after exchange. Our guide on engaging land surveyors covers which survey product answers which question.

The trap here is a quiet one: a feasibility built on a registered area that is two or three per cent larger than the real parcel does not fail loudly. It fails as a yield that will not fit at development application stage.

The registered proprietor and the tenancy held

The proprietor line tells you who has to sign, and the tenancy tells you what happens if one of them cannot. Tasmania’s registry describes this field as “current owner’s names and tenancies held” (Land Titles Office Tasmania).

For site assembly, the questions that follow are practical. Where land is held by more than one proprietor, every one of them may need to execute the option or contract, and a single holdout can stall a parcel that the feasibility already depends on. Where a company is registered as proprietor, its status and the authority of whoever signs become live issues. Where a trustee is registered, the terms of the trust may limit what can be done without a beneficiary’s consent. Where a proprietor has died, the chain of authority to deal with the land may need to be established before anything can register.

None of those are matters to resolve from a title search. They are matters to identify from a title search and hand to a lawyer early, because each of them is a timing risk rather than a cost risk, and timing risk on a site under option is expensive.

Mortgages and other registered charges

A registered mortgage is the entry most likely to control your programme without changing your cost plan. The reason is consent. Registering a plan of subdivision, creating an easement, lodging a restrictive covenant or registering a long lease over mortgaged land will generally require the mortgagee’s consent or a discharge, and the mortgagee is under no obligation to move at your pace.

The consideration for a developer is sequencing: a plan of subdivision that has to register before presale contracts can settle, sitting behind a consent from a party with no commercial interest in your settlement date, is a dependency worth identifying at due diligence rather than at registration. Related registered charges, including charges under state revenue legislation, raise the same consent question.

Easements: the entry that moves yield

An easement is a right one parcel holds over another. On a title it appears either as a burden (something crossing your land) or a benefit (something you hold over a neighbour), and the distinction is the first thing to establish, because a developer reading a benefit as a burden walks away from a good site and the reverse is worse.

The entries that matter most on a development parcel tend to be drainage and sewerage easements, electricity easements, and rights of carriageway. What each does to the scheme depends on the registered instrument, not on the category: width, position, whether the easement permits structures over it, and what the authority in whose favour it exists will approve. A build-over approval from the relevant authority is sometimes available and sometimes not, and the answer generally determines whether a basement, a slab or a tower core can sit where the design has put it.

In New South Wales, the instrument creating easements on a subdivision is typically the section 88B instrument, lodged with the deposited plan. Section 88B of the Conveyancing Act 1919 (NSW) is headed “Creation and release of easements, profits à prendre and restrictions on use of land by plans”, and the instrument itself is where the terms sit. Reading the plan without reading the instrument is a common and expensive shortcut: the plan shows the geometry, the instrument shows what the geometry permits.

Our guide on easements and rights of way deals with the categories and the creation and release mechanics in more depth.

A restrictive covenant restricts what can be done on land, for the benefit of other land. Land Use Victoria’s description of a covenant as “a written agreement between the seller and purchaser of a piece of land restricting what the land can be used for” captures the private nature of it (Land Use Victoria glossary).

The point developers most often get wrong is the relationship between a covenant and a planning approval. They are separate systems. A consent authority granting approval for twelve townhouses does not release a single-dwelling covenant, and the beneficiaries of the covenant are private parties with their own rights. A development approval obtained over a covenant that prohibits the development is an approval you may not be able to build.

Covenant wording in older subdivisions can be oddly specific: a single dwelling only, a minimum floor area, particular external materials, no further subdivision, no commercial use, a building envelope. Each of those translates directly into a yield or a cost. Courts in each state have jurisdiction to modify or extinguish restrictive covenants, and so in some cases do planning processes, but the pathway, the prospects and the timeframe are legal questions on the specific wording. The guide on restrictive covenants goes through the mechanics.

Positive covenants and continuing obligations

A positive covenant requires something to be done rather than refrained from, and it binds successors. On development sites these commonly attach to on-site detention systems, retaining structures, bushfire asset protection zones, landscaping or acoustic treatments imposed as a condition of an earlier approval.

The feasibility consideration is that a positive covenant is a permanent operating cost attached to the land, not a one-off construction item. On a build-to-hold scheme it sits in the outgoings. On a build-to-sell scheme it moves into the owners corporation or body corporate budget, which means it shows up in levies, which means it shows up in your presale story.

Caveats and unregistered dealings

A caveat records a claim to an interest and operates as a notice to the registrar rather than as security in its own right. On a site under assembly, caveats cut both ways: you may be lodging them to protect an option or a joint venture contribution, and you may be reading somebody else’s sitting on a parcel you want. Our caveats guide covers lodgement, lapsing and removal state by state, including the mechanisms available in New South Wales for protecting a dealing before lodgement.

The related entry, where the registry publishes it, is the list of dealings lodged but not yet registered. Tasmania’s registry describes the folio text as including a “list of any unregistered dealings” (Land Titles Office Tasmania). A dealing in the queue is something to understand before settlement, not after.

Leases and tenancies

A registered lease binds you as incoming proprietor on its registered terms. The length of the term, the options to renew, the rent review mechanism and the make-good obligations are all relevant, but for a developer the single number that matters is the date on which vacant possession becomes available, because it sets the earliest demolition date and therefore the start of the construction programme.

Unregistered short tenancies are a separate problem, and the Torrens legislation deals with them expressly. Section 42(1)(d) of the Real Property Act 1900 (NSW) preserves, against a registered proprietor, the interest of a tenant in possession or entitled to immediate possession, limited to terms not exceeding three years in total including any option (Real Property Act 1900 (NSW) s 42). In other words, a tenancy you cannot see on the title may still bind you.

The practical consequence is that a title search is not a vacant possession search. A site inspection, a tenancy schedule and a contractual vacant possession obligation are what answer that question. A demolition date built on the title alone is a date built on incomplete information.

Planning instruments and agreements recorded on title

Some planning obligations are recorded against the title and run with the land. In Victoria, agreements under the planning legislation are the common example, and they can carry development obligations, contribution obligations and use restrictions that survive a change of owner. New South Wales planning agreements can be registered in the same way.

Heritage agreements, conservation covenants and similar instruments appear in the same part of a title in several states. Each is worth reading in full rather than by category name, because the obligations inside two instruments with the same label can be very different.

Notations, administrative advices and other warnings

Registries record a range of administrative entries that are not interests as such but are warnings: notations about the quality of the title, advices lodged by government agencies, writs and similar enforcement entries, and notations relating to Crown land or native title. Where the title carries a notation limiting the guarantee, as with the qualified and limited titles that exist in some jurisdictions for land converted from the old deeds system, the extent of the limitation is a question for a lawyer and sometimes for a surveyor. The habit worth forming is that any line on a title you cannot immediately explain is a question, not a formality.

What the Register does not tell you

This is the part of the exercise that decides whether a title search was useful. Indefeasibility of title is strong, but it is not total, and it says nothing at all about a long list of things that determine whether a site can be developed.

The statutory exceptions to indefeasibility

The Torrens principle is that the registered proprietor holds the land free of interests that are not recorded. Section 42 of the Real Property Act 1900 (NSW) states that the registered proprietor of an estate or interest recorded in a folio of the Register “shall, except in case of fraud, hold the same, subject to such other estates and interests and such entries, if any, as are recorded in that folio, but absolutely free from all other estates and interests that are not so recorded except” for a set of listed exceptions (Real Property Act 1900 (NSW) s 42).

Those exceptions are the ones a developer should be able to name, because each is a way an unrecorded interest can bind you. On the New South Wales wording they include interests recorded in a prior folio, omitted or misdescribed easements existing before the land came under the Act or validly created after it, omitted or misdescribed profits à prendre, land wrongly included through a boundary misdescription (with a carve-out for purchasers and mortgagees for value), and the short tenancies described above. Fraud sits outside the guarantee entirely.

Every Australian jurisdiction has an equivalent provision with its own wording and its own exception list, and Tasmania’s framing that the Register “is and has always been conclusive evidence of estates or interests in land” should be read alongside its own statutory exceptions (Land Titles Office Tasmania). The exceptions are not identical between states, which is one of the reasons a national developer tends to use local lawyers rather than a single template.

The omitted easement exception is the one that matters most on development land. An easement that should have been recorded and was not may still bind the parcel, which means a clean title is evidence of a clean parcel rather than proof of one. Physical signs on site, drainage running the wrong way, a worn vehicle track, an inspection pit, a neighbour’s downpipe, are worth more than they look.

Everything that was never a title matter

The longer list is of things the Register does not purport to cover at all:

Planning controls, zoning, height and floor space controls, overlays and the development standards that actually set your yield sit in planning instruments and planning certificates, not on title. In New South Wales the planning certificate is the companion document, and our guide on the section 10.7 certificate covers what it does and does not disclose.

Contamination history, acid sulfate soils and fill are not title matters. Nor is geotechnical condition, which is the single input most capable of moving a basement cost.

Flooding, bushfire attack level, coastal hazard and landslip mapping come from planning and hazard layers rather than from the Register.

Infrastructure inside the parcel is a particularly expensive gap. A sewer main or stormwater line crossing a site may be protected by an easement, in which case it shows on title, or it may not be, in which case it does not. The authority’s own asset plans are where that question is answered.

Heritage listing, whether statutory or local, may or may not generate a title entry.

Unapproved building works, outstanding orders and compliance history sit with the council.

Native title and Aboriginal cultural heritage obligations operate under their own statutory regimes.

The habit worth keeping is to treat a title search as one document in a due diligence set rather than as the due diligence. Our guide on property due diligence for developers sets out the full set and the order to run it in.

How a registered interest moves a feasibility

The cleanest way to see why title work belongs before the land price is settled is to put a number on one easement.

Take a 2,800 square metre parcel in a medium density zone, with a scheme for twelve townhouses. The numbers below are illustrative and the inputs would come from a cost plan and agency advice on a real site.

Gross realisation is twelve townhouses at $1,100,000 each, so $13,200,000. Construction is $4,800,000, being twelve at $400,000. Professional fees, authority contributions, finance, holding and selling costs together are $2,400,000. Suppose the required development margin is 20 per cent on total development cost.

Total development cost is the land price plus $7,200,000. If revenue of $13,200,000 has to equal 1.2 times total development cost, then total development cost is $11,000,000, and the land price the scheme supports is $3,800,000. Profit is $2,200,000.

Now suppose the title search turns up a three metre wide drainage easement running across the rear boundary, and the relevant authority will not permit building over it. The developable footprint shrinks and the scheme drops to ten townhouses.

The changed inputs are these. Gross realisation becomes ten at $1,100,000, so $11,000,000. Construction becomes ten at $400,000, so $4,000,000. Other costs fall only partly, because planning, civil and finance costs do not scale with unit count, so take them at $2,100,000. Costs excluding land are therefore $6,100,000. Holding the same 20 per cent margin on cost, total development cost is $11,000,000 divided by 1.2, or $9,166,667, and the supportable land price is $3,066,667.

The easement has taken roughly $733,300 off what the land is worth to this scheme, against a land price of $3,800,000. It is a little over 19 per cent of the land budget, found in a document that costs tens of dollars to order. That is the argument for ordering the title and the registered instruments before the price is agreed rather than after, and for reading the instrument rather than the plan.

The same arithmetic applies to a single-dwelling covenant, a positive covenant with an operating cost attached, or a tenancy that pushes vacant possession nine months past the date the finance assumed.

When to do title work in a development deal

The sequencing question is less about what to order and more about what each stage of the deal is allowed to assume.

At the point of first interest, before any money is spent, a title search and the registered instruments are cheap enough that there is no reason to form a view on a site without them. What you are looking for at this stage is a reason to stop.

Before an option or a contract of sale is signed, the questions are whether every proprietor who needs to sign can sign, whether anything on title defeats the scheme outright, and whether anything on title needs a third party’s consent on your timetable. This is also the point at which a due diligence clause earns its place, because it buys the time to resolve what the title raises.

Before the development application, the scheme should be checked against the registered instruments rather than against their summaries, and against a current survey rather than the registered area.

Before finance settles, the title position needs to be current, because a dealing lodged by somebody else between your search and your settlement is a real risk and the search is a point-in-time document.

Before settlement, a fresh search is the standard step. The gap between the last search and settlement is exactly the window in which a caveat, a writ or a competing dealing appears.

On a subdivision, the title work continues well past settlement, because the plan and the instruments creating the easements, covenants and lots are a registration exercise in their own right. That registration sequence, and the mortgagee consents inside it, generally sits on the critical path between practical completion and the first settlement.

What to ask your lawyer

The questions below are the ones that turn a title search into a decision. They are drafted to be answerable on your specific parcel, which is why the guide does not answer them.

On the registered interests themselves

Reading the registered instrument rather than the title summary, does this easement permit any structure over it, and on what terms?
Is each easement on this title a burden or a benefit, and where exactly does it sit relative to the proposed building envelope?
What does this restrictive covenant actually prohibit on its wording, who holds the benefit of it, and are those beneficiaries identifiable and locatable?
What is the pathway to modify or extinguish this covenant in this state, what has to be proved, and what is a realistic timeframe and cost range?
Does our development application, if granted, leave us exposed to enforcement by a covenant beneficiary?
What continuing obligations does this positive covenant impose, who enforces them, and where do they sit once the scheme is subdivided?

On the proprietor, consents and execution

Who must execute the option, the contract and each later dealing for it to be registrable, and is there anything about the registered proprietor’s status that complicates that?
Which of our planned dealings will require the mortgagee’s consent or a discharge, and in what order?
What is the realistic lead time on each of those consents, and what happens to our programme if one of them is late?

On what the title does not show

Which exceptions to indefeasibility in this state could leave us bound by an interest that is not recorded on this folio?
What would you order beyond the title search to test for an omitted easement, an unregistered tenancy or an unrecorded infrastructure asset on this parcel?
Is this title subject to any notation that limits the guarantee, and if so what is actually unguaranteed?
What vacant possession position does the contract give us, and what is our remedy if possession is late?

On timing

When should each search be refreshed between exchange and settlement, and who is responsible for refreshing it?
Is there a mechanism in this state to protect our dealing against a competing lodgement in the gap before registration, and does it fit our transaction?

What to ask your surveyor

What is the surveyed area and dimension of this parcel, and how does it compare with the registered area?
Where do the registered easements physically sit, and what buildable footprint remains once each is plotted and any required clearance applied?
Are there physical indications on site of a right of way, drainage line or service that is not reflected on the title?
Do the existing improvements, fences or structures sit within the registered boundaries, or is there an encroachment either way?
What survey product do we need at each stage, and what does each one actually certify?

Frequently asked questions

Do certificates of title still exist in Australia?

Mostly not as documents. New South Wales abolished them with effect from 11 October 2021, Western Australia removed duplicate certificates of title on 7 August 2023, Titles Queensland has ceased issuing paper certificates, and from 3 August 2024 all new Victorian certificates of title have been electronic. Land Use Victoria notes that existing paper Victorian certificates remain valid “until they are next required for a conveyancing transaction”. In each jurisdiction the Register is the operative record, and what you order is a search of it.

What is the difference between a certificate of title and a title search?

In current practice the distinction has largely collapsed. A title search is an extract from the Register showing the current position for a parcel. Where the phrase “certificate of title” is still used, as in Western Australia’s Original Certificate of Title, it generally refers to the registry’s own electronic record rather than to a document held by the owner.

Does a title search show planning restrictions?

Generally not. Zoning, height and floor space controls, overlays and development standards sit in planning instruments and planning certificates rather than on the Register. Some planning obligations recorded as agreements against the land do appear on title, but a title search is not a substitute for a planning certificate and a planning review.

Can a development approval override a restrictive covenant on title?

No, and treating a covenant and a planning approval as the same system is a common and costly error. A covenant is a private right held by the owners of other land. A consent authority granting approval does not release it. Whether a particular covenant can be modified or extinguished, and by what pathway, is a question for a lawyer on the covenant’s exact wording.

Will a title search tell me whether the site has tenants?

Not reliably. A registered lease will appear. An unregistered short tenancy may not, and in New South Wales section 42(1)(d) of the Real Property Act 1900 (NSW) preserves the interest of a tenant in possession for terms not exceeding three years including options. A site inspection, a tenancy schedule and a contractual vacant possession obligation are what answer the question.

Is the area shown on the title the area I should use for yield?

Generally not without a survey. The registered area can differ from the surveyed area for several reasons, including historical plan accuracy and resumptions not yet reflected. A current identification survey is what establishes the site area a floor space or plot ratio should be applied to.

How often should a title be re-searched during a development transaction?

The search is a point-in-time document, so the practical answer is at every stage where a decision or a payment depends on it, and again immediately before settlement. The window between the last search and settlement is where a competing dealing, caveat or writ would appear.

Does abolishing paper certificates of title weaken a developer’s ownership?

The registries say it does not. Titles Queensland’s position is that abolition “does not impact indefeasibility”, and the NSW Registrar General’s is that the Register “remains and has always been the single source of truth as to a person’s ownership or interest in land”. What changed is the evidence of ownership, not the ownership.

Is the title register public?

In South Australia it is expressly an open register, and Land Services SA describes it as “freely accessible to anyone who wishes to search for information about a particular property”, pointing to section 65 of the Real Property Act 1886 (SA). In Tasmania, anyone who pays the prescribed fee can search a title. The practical implication for site assembly is that your registered dealings are visible to others, including competing bidders.

Is the Australian Capital Territory different?

Materially, yes. Almost all land is held under Crown lease rather than freehold, and the lease purpose clause controls use and development rights. The ACT government notes that lease variations can vary the lease purpose and adjust development rights including gross floor area (GFA), that all variations depend on Territory Plan requirements, and that a Crown lease can carry obligations to commence construction within 12 months or complete within 24 months, or both.

Practical takeaways

A title search is cheap, fast and the earliest place a site’s real constraints show up, which makes ordering it before forming a view on price the least expensive discipline available in a development business.

The plan shows the geometry; the registered instrument shows what the geometry permits. Reading one without the other is where most easement surprises come from.

A clean title is evidence of a clean parcel, not proof of one. The statutory exceptions to indefeasibility, omitted easements and short tenancies in particular, are the ways an interest you cannot see can still bind you.

Every entry on a title has a cost, a yield or a date attached to it. A mortgage is usually a date, an easement is usually a yield, a positive covenant is usually an ongoing cost, and a tenancy is usually all three.

Anything on a title you cannot explain in one sentence is a question for a lawyer, not a formality to be filed.