Sometimes conveyancers and attorneys make mistakes. Sometimes the Deeds Office also misses the mistake and a title deed will get registered incorrectly. Unfortunately, this mistake will then have to be fixed when the property is transferred again to a new owner.
In which circumstances will this happen?
Scenario 1 – Errors in personal details:
A typical error will be a name. The writer of this article’s name is Mari-Jani. Let’s say I own a property. When they drafted my documents, they incorrectly put my name on the deed as Marie-Janie and it was registered like that. Now I am buying a second property and the Deeds Office flags my Id number because the name does not match their records. My conveyancers will have to obtain my previous Deed – and bond holder consent if I have a bond – to lodge a 4(1)(b) application to fix the previous conveyancer’s mistake. It will be the same process for a mistake in marital status or Id number.
Scenario 2 – Incorrect conditions:
The Deeds Office can also reject your documents if they are not happy with how conditions read in the current title deed. The Deeds Office will reject your matter and tell you to fix it or even go so far as to tell you to investigate it if they are not entirely surely themselves what’s wrong with it. The conveyancer may have to go back to all the previous deeds to see where people made the typing error or to where the condition does not match the current deed to fix it or even – in worst case scenarios – go back to the Surveyors diagrams from which your property is registered.
If the Deeds Office feels that a Section 4(1)(b) application is applicable, they will reject the transfer documents based on that.
The good news is that we do have a good idea what it is that the Deeds Office is looking for and we try to anticipate it as far as we can. Should we ever have to give you the bad news that your transaction has been rejected due to a mistake on the holding title, this is how it happened. It was not our mistake, but we are certainly going to help you fix it.