Do I need an Abstract to sell my house?

If you have owned your Minnesota home for a long time, you likely have the Abstract of Title for your house tucked away somewhere safe… often in a safety deposit box. It used to be that when you sold your house you had to have your Abstract updated for the buyer with everything that had happened affecting the title since you bought it. If you couldn’t find your Abstract you had to pay to have it re-built showing the history of chain of ownership, often at substantial cost. It was a big deal to keep it safe.

Things have changed and most Minnesota buyers now use title insurance to insure their title based on an electronic title search with no one even looking at the Abstract. In most cases sellers are off the hook for locating their title, and buyers pay for the title search. If the title search results in any defects to the chain of ownership title, however, that is still the seller’s responsibility. That is why most buyers purchase title insurance to protect themselves against anything that could come up in the title search when they sell.

Many people don’t realize that Minnesota is one of only a few states where ownership of real estate is determined in one of two ways – the Abstract system or the Torrens system. About 55% of Hennepin county properties are Abstract, and about 45% Torrens.

Fewer issues come up when selling and transferring title with a Torrens property than with an Abstract property because anything affecting title (such as liens, mortgages, transfers of property among family members after an owner’s death) must be registered and recorded when it happens, not just when the property is sold.

With today’s technology nearly everything can be found online so written Abstracts of Title have largely become a historical record rather than a legal one. If you have your Abstract you can pass it on to your buyers at closing. This happened at a recent closing where my buyer was fascinated searching through the historical Abstract of his new home… it went back to 1836!

Sharlene Hensrud, RE/MAX Results – shensrud@homesmsp.com – 612-419-0560

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I love what I do! Highly insightful, analytical and creative, there is nothing I love more than helping you find the right solution for your real estate transition. My mission is to serve my clients with honesty and integrity, exceeding their expectations in service and support… and to help others by donating a portion of every transaction to Habitat for Humanity.

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