New York County Property Records in New York

A New York County title search examines the recorded history of a Manhattan property, and the essential first step is to determine the form of ownership, because a condominium and a fee property are searched through their recorded deeds in ACRIS while a cooperative is searched through the corporation’s records and the UCC index. For a condo or fee property, the search reads the ACRIS chain to confirm ownership, identifies every open mortgage and lien, confirms releases, searches the New York County Clerk and the courts for judgments and any foreclosure, and checks the city agencies for HPD violations, sidewalk violations, and DEP water and sewer liens. For a co-op, it examines the share ownership and the UCC filings that secure share loans. Because Manhattan property is so often a co-op that is not real property, and because the city records through ACRIS rather than a county clerk, a reliable title search reads ACRIS, the County Clerk, the courts, and the city agencies together. You can search ACRIS yourself for a condo or fee property, but a complete examination that identifies the ownership form, searches a co-op the right way, and reaches the city liens is what catches the issues a deed search misses. U.S. Title Records performs the full search and delivers it by email, with the Expanded Title Search ($375) as the most comprehensive option.

A cooperative, or co-op, is a form of apartment ownership that is very common in Manhattan and that is fundamentally different from owning real estate. When you buy a co-op, you do not receive a deed to a piece of real property. Instead, you buy shares in a cooperative corporation that owns the building, and those shares come with a proprietary lease that gives you the right to occupy a particular apartment. Because what you own is shares and a lease, your interest is personal property, not real property, and that single fact changes everything about how a co-op is searched. There is no deed recorded in ACRIS for your unit, so a deed search will not show a co-op the way it shows a condo or a townhouse. A loan to buy a co-op is a share loan, and the lender secures it with a UCC filing and a recognition agreement among the lender, the buyer, and the corporation, rather than with a recorded mortgage, so the financing shows up in the UCC index, not in the mortgage records. The correct title work for a co-op is a co-op and UCC lien search against the corporation and the shares, together with a review of the corporation’s standing, rather than a fee title search of a recorded chain. Co-ops also typically require board approval to buy and often charge a flip tax when you sell. For all of these reasons, the first job of a Manhattan search is to confirm whether a property is a co-op, a condo, or fee. U.S. Title Records searches co-op shares and UCC filings in the Full Owner Lien Report ($195) and the UCC search.

ACRIS stands for the Automated City Register Information System, and it is the New York City system for recording and searching property documents, run by the Office of the City Register within the New York City Department of Finance. New York City does not use the county clerk offices that handle recording in the rest of the state. Instead, the City Register records deeds, mortgages, liens, and related documents for four of the five boroughs, Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, and the Bronx, through ACRIS, while Staten Island records with the Richmond County Clerk. ACRIS holds records from 1966 to the present and can be searched by property address, by party name, or by the Borough-Block-Lot number, the city’s parcel identifier in which each borough has its own blocks and each block has numbered lots, so a Manhattan property might be identified as a particular block and lot. For a title search, ACRIS is the core source for the recorded chain and the mortgages and liens on a condominium or fee property, but it is not the whole picture: judgments are docketed with the County Clerk, and city charges such as HPD violations and DEP water liens live with the city agencies, so a complete search reaches beyond ACRIS. U.S. Title Records searches ACRIS and the related records and delivers the result by email, starting at the Property Detail Report ($29).

The difference is what you actually own and how it is recorded, and it is the most important distinction in a Manhattan property search. In a condominium, you own real property: you hold a deed to your individual unit plus an undivided interest in the building’s common elements, the deed and the condominium declaration and bylaws are recorded in ACRIS, and a loan is a normal mortgage recorded against your unit. A condo is searched like any other piece of real estate, through its recorded chain, mortgages, and liens. In a cooperative, you do not own real property at all: you own shares in the corporation that owns the building and hold a proprietary lease to your apartment, nothing is recorded in ACRIS as a deed for your unit, and a loan is a share loan secured by a UCC filing rather than a mortgage. A co-op is searched through the corporation and the UCC index. The practical effects flow from that: condos generally have fewer restrictions on transfer, while co-ops usually require board approval and may charge a flip tax on resale. For a buyer, lender, or attorney, knowing whether a property is a co-op or a condo determines where the answer lives and how the title work is done, which is why a Manhattan search establishes the ownership form before anything else. U.S. Title Records identifies the form in the Property Detail Report ($29) and searches it correctly in the Full Owner Lien Report ($195).

New York City layers several taxes and potential liens onto a Manhattan transaction that do not exist in most of the country. On the tax side, a recorded mortgage carries the mortgage recording tax, which in New York City is the highest in the country, a sale is subject to the Real Property Transfer Tax, and most Manhattan purchases also trigger the mansion tax given the price level of the market. These taxes are paid at closing and appear in the recorded consideration and the transfer tax returns. On the lien side, a Manhattan property can carry city charges that a deed search alone will not reveal: an HPD violation from the housing agency, a DOT sidewalk violation filed against the property, and a DEP water and sewer charge that is treated like a tax debt and carries priority over most other liens. Rent stabilization is a separate consideration that does not create a lien but affects value and is confirmed through DHCR records. A complete Manhattan search accounts for the taxes that shape the closing and reaches the city agencies for the liens that a simple deed search would miss. U.S. Title Records reports the recorded taxes and the city liens in the Full Owner Lien Report ($195).

Pricing is the same in New York County and across all 62 New York counties: Property Detail Report $29, Deed Copy $45, Title Search by Name $75, Lien Report $95, Full Owner Lien Report $195, Chain of Title $275, and Expanded Title Search $375. The $29 report is the quick ownership, parcel, and value check that also identifies whether a property is a co-op, a condo, or fee, the $195 report is the recommended due-diligence search that includes the UCC, city-lien, and foreclosure picture, and the $375 Expanded is the full title examination with chain and document review. There is no account, subscription, or commitment, one fee per property, delivered as a PDF by email. See the full schedule of fees. BBB A+ since 2009.