Deeds & Probate Registry
Introduction | FeesIntroduction
The Deeds & Probate Registry is part of the Registries Section of the General Registry and is situated in the Registries Building on Deemsters Walk, Bucks Road, Douglas, Isle of Man, IM1 3AR. The Registry is open to members of the public Monday to Thursday: 9.30 a.m. - 4.30 p.m. and Friday: 9.30 a.m. - 4.00 p.m.
All deeds registered from 1911 to the present day are available for viewing in the Deeds & Probate Registry along with all Grants of Probate from 1950 to the present day. Grants of Probate recorded from 1911 to 1949 inclusive are housed offsite and can be ordered by Registries Section staff. The file will normally be available within 3 working days. All deeds and Grants of Probate recorded prior to 1911 are housed in the Manx Museum. For information about how to make an application for Probate please see Probate and Administration of Estates in the Isle of Man.
Staff of the Registries Section are responsible for the registration, receipt and safe-keeping of all deeds recorded under the auspice of the Registration of Deeds Act . The staff of the Deeds & Probate Registry are not permitted to give legal advice.
Deeds should be presented for registration with the prescribed fee. The deed will be marked with a unique registration number, the parish to which it refers (as given in the deed), the name of the person presenting the deed for registration along with the time and date of registration. When a deed is presented for registration, staff are not permitted to check the content or style of a deed and are prohibited from giving opinions about the contents of any document presented to them. A deed should not be considered 'recorded' until a Certificate of Registration is issued.
All documents held in the Deeds & Probate Registry under the Registration of Deeds Act are available for public viewing on payment of the prescribed fee. Certified and Court sealed copies can be provided.
Access to the vast majority of the information is via name based indices (both paper and electronic) and therefore it is extremely unlikely that an individual deed, e.g. relating to a property, can be located from the address alone. Please note that deeds and Grants of Probate relate only to property situated on the Isle of Man.
Registries staff are prohibited from undertaking searches - for deeds and Grants of Probate - on behalf of customers.
If you do not know who owns a property now but you do know a previous owner's name(s), it is possible to trace the deeds to the property by searching under the previous owner's name(s). If you have neither a current owner or previous owner's name(s), you can contact the Rates Section within the Treasury Department (01624 685661) and providing the property has a rateable value they should be able to confirm the name of the owner(s) or occupier(s).
Where land has no rateable value, such as on some derelict properties or on farmland, enquiries can be made to the Planning Section of the Department of Infrastructure to see whether any planning applications have been submitted on the land from which owner/contact details might be obtained. Other avenues of enquiry may include local knowledge, i.e. from nearby land owners, local Commissioners or by establishing a historical owner from the Woods Atlas. The Woods Atlas was compiled in 1867 and identifies the extent of individual landowners in each parish in the Isle of Man at that time. The name of the landowner in 1867 can then be used to search forward through the deeds housed in the Manx Museum up until 1910, and thereafter in the Deeds & Probate Registry up to the present date.
People often request to view deeds in the hope of settling a boundary dispute. Although a deed contains a description of the land purchased, it will not necessarily provide conclusive evidence of either who owns the boundary or exactly where the boundary lies. The deed may also contain a plan of the land purchased, but again this is unlikely to provide conclusive evidence of either who owns the boundary or exactly where the boundary lies.
Providing you know the registration number, you can obtain a copy of a deed or Grant of Probate by making a request in writing and enclosing the prescribed fee to cover the cost of extraction, photocopying and postage. If you do not know the registration number, you will need to attend the office (or ask someone to do so on your behalf) to search the various indices to find the reference number.
Please do not send cash through the post. All payments must be in Sterling and cheques should be made payable to 'Isle of Man Government', crossed 'Account Payee Only' with the cheque guarantee details written on the reverse, i.e. card number, limit, expiry date and name of the card holder. It is not necessary to send a stamped self addressed envelope.
Having completed a search, there is no guarantee that the last deed will reflect who owns a particular property as the registration of a deed is not compulsory. Once a deed has been registered it can not be altered in any way.
The Registries Section holds at its public counter a copy of the Public Footpaths and Rights of Way Definitive maps for customers to view, free of charge, upon request. If further information is required, the Department of Infrastructure holds detailed accounts of each public footpath and right of way.
Fees
To view the fees for the Deeds & Probate Registry, please see the downloadable document below.
For anwsers to most frequently asked questions visit the FAQs page
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