Land Grants and the Torrens Title System
A land grant marked the first Certificate of Title offered by the Crown to the Land Owner. With the Torrens system a Volume and Folio Reference through numerical order was established.
Created by Sir Robert Torrens and some invaluable other men of the time, the remarkable Torrens system which began in South Australia in 1858, spread Australia wide and is now in many countries worldwide.
With every state being responsible for their land registration, the beginnings of this new land system allowed for better proof of land holding. Previously, land titles passed by the execution of deeds, but the Torrens system created a public register of dealings. Once registered, the title of a purchaser became indefeasible unless he was guilty of fraud. This meant innocent dealers with interests in registered land were guaranteed either their interest in the land or monetary compensation.
With one certificate held by the government department and the duplicate being held by the owner a beautiful record of that land parcels history could be found on the parchment. With a list of endorsements, a trail of occurences to the land were imprinted via a stamp. With many transactions occurring, a Certificate of Title reference number remained current until the parchment was full. At this point the Title would be cancelled and a new one issued. Thankfully as the government departments always held a record you can still research the old titles today and go back on all the endorsements from a piece of land right back to when the parcel of land was created.
Sadly, the old historical Certificate of TItle on parchment are now obsolete. These made way for a computerised system back in the 1990s where all titles became computerised and started with a 5000 Volume number. A green A4 paper sheet containing only the current endorsements superseded showing all former endorsements.
Although this simplified the Lands TItle system for many Conveyancers having to search through endorsements to discover what was obsolete and what was still current, it was sad to see the history disappear. You will however find many conveyancers around South Australia still hold treasured old Titles in their offices. This makes for a great display of the progress on the land system in our state.
As progression continues to make way for the future, even these simplified green computerised Titles have now made way for the digital age. An age where we have become paperless saving the environment but taking away a bit more of our past history.
PEXA being the Property Exchange Newtork in Australia has replaced the old way of doing property settlements where Titles were physically exchanged and interests registered. Duplicate Title Deeds now no longer physically exist. 5 years in, the history of Property TItle Deeds has come a long way and will continue to move forward in the 21st century.