Land Registration

Hong Kong operates a deeds registration system under the Land
Registration Ordinance. The Land Registry is responsible for registering
all documents affecting land. The Land Registry comprises the Urban
Land Registry and eight New Territories Land Registries.

The Land Registration Ordinance provides that all land documents
registered under it shall have priority according to their respective dates of
registration. If a document is registered within one month of execution,
priority shall relate to the date of execution of the document. Registration
is essential to the protection of a land title but does not guarantee it.

A land document is registered by delivering it to the appropriate land
registry with a form containing the essential particulars of the document
and the prescribed fee. These particulars are then entered into a register
for the relevant piece of land or property.

All land registers are computerised. Each land register provides a
complete picture of all transactions affecting a property, from the grant of
the lease. The registers, memorials and related land documents are
available for search by members of the public at the respective land
registries on payment of a small fee. A purchaser or mortgagee will be
able to check and satisfy himself from the land register as to the nature of
the title he is intending to purchase or accept by way of security.

The Direct Access Services, an on-line computer search facility, allows
its subscribers, mainly solicitors and other professional firms, to have
direct access to the computerised registers and to place orders for copies
of land records from computer terminals in their own offices.

The Document Imaging System enables land documents presented for
registration to be scanned and stored as electronic images on optical
discs. The images can be retrieved and distributed quickly.

All paper land documents in the eight New Territories Land Registries
were converted into electronic images in May 1997. Conversion of the
microfilmed land documents of the Urban Land Registry into electronic
images started in June 1997 for completion by the end of 1998.

The Memorial Day Book, which is computerised and contains essential
data of land documents lodged for registration each day, can be viewed
by its subscribers on computers in their offices.

Land Registration statistics are at Appendix 40.

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