FS Exam Preparation

Comprehensive preparation for the Fundamentals of Surveying (FS) exam. 7 modules covering all 7 exam domains with 60 in-depth topics.

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Lesson 1

Public Records & Land Descriptions

Learning Objectives

After completing this topic, you should be able to:

Describe the purpose of the public recording system
Explain the concept of constructive notice and actual notice
Define chain of title and its importance in boundary surveying
Identify the types of documents found in public records
Understand the recording acts (race, notice, race-notice)
Describe how surveyors research public records for boundary work

Overview

The public recording system is the foundation of property law in the United States. It provides a mechanism for property owners to give constructive notice to the world of their ownership and interests in real property. For surveyors, the public records are the starting point for every boundary survey -- they contain the deeds, plats, easements, and other documents that define property boundaries.

Key Concepts

Figure FS.3.1 — The public recording system: recording acts (race, notice, race-notice), types of notice (actual, inquiry, constructive), purpose, and chain of title

Figure FS.3.1b — Recording Acts and Notice Types (detail)

Purpose of the Recording System

The recording system serves several critical functions:

Constructive notice: Once a document is properly recorded, all subsequent purchasers are deemed to have knowledge of it, whether or not they actually examined the records
Priority of interests: The recording system establishes the order of priority among competing claims to the same property
Title assurance: Purchasers can examine the records to determine the state of title before acquiring property
Permanent preservation: Recorded documents are maintained indefinitely as public records

Notice Types

Figure FS.3.1e — Actual / Constructive / Inquiry notice

Actual notice: The buyer has direct, personal knowledge of a claim or interest (e.g., someone told them about an easement, or they saw a fence across the property).

Constructive notice: The buyer is legally deemed to know about any interest that is properly recorded in the public records, even if they never actually searched the records. Recording provides constructive notice.

Inquiry notice: Facts that would lead a reasonable person to investigate further. For example, a well-worn path across a property should prompt inquiry about a possible easement.

Chain of Title

Figure FS.3.1d — Chain of title across deed transfers

The chain of title is the sequence of recorded documents tracing ownership of a parcel from the original sovereign (usually the U.S. government or the original state) through each successive owner to the present day.

Why surveyors research the chain of title:

To identify all descriptions that have defined the property boundaries
To discover easements, restrictions, and other encumbrances
To determine senior and junior rights among adjacent parcels
To find references to prior surveys, plats, and monuments
To identify potential gaps, overlaps, or ambiguities in the descriptions

Key documents in the chain of title:

Patents (government-to-private transfer)
Deeds (private-to-private transfer)
Subdivision plats
Easement documents
Court orders (partition, quiet title)
Tax sale documents

Types of Public Records

Record Type	Location	Contains
Deeds	County recorder/registrar	Property descriptions, grantor/grantee, consideration
Plats/maps	County recorder, surveyor's office	Subdivision layouts, lot dimensions, easements
Records of Survey	County recorder, surveyor's office	Boundary evidence, monuments, surveyor's analysis
Corner Records (required in California and certain other western states; not universal)	County surveyor's office	Monument conditions, accessories, coordinates
Easement documents	County recorder	Easement descriptions, grantee, purpose
Tax records	County assessor	Parcel identification, ownership, assessed value
Court records	County clerk/court	Judgments, quiet title actions, partitions
PLSS records	BLM/GLO	Original survey plats, field notes

Recording Acts

Figure FS.3.1f — Race / Notice / Race-Notice recording statutes

States use different recording statutes to determine priority among competing claims (Stoebuck & Whitman, The Law of Property, 3d Ed., §11.9; Restatement (Third) of Property: Servitudes §7.14):

Race statute: The first to record wins, regardless of knowledge of prior unrecorded interests. (Very rare today.)

Notice statute: A subsequent buyer who purchases in good faith and without notice of a prior unrecorded interest prevails over the prior unrecorded interest holder.

Race-notice statute: A subsequent buyer who purchases in good faith, without notice, and records first prevails. This is the most common type in the United States.

The Surveyor's Record Research Process

Figure FS.3.1c — Public records & the surveyor's record research process: 8-step workflow from identifying subject parcel through synthesizing evidence; grantor-grantee and tract indexes

Identify the subject parcel from the assessor's parcel number (APN) or owner name
Obtain the current deed and read the legal description
Trace the chain of title backward to identify all prior descriptions and conveyances
Research adjoining parcels to understand the relationship of the subject parcel to its neighbors
Find recorded plats and surveys that affect the subject parcel
Search for easements and encumbrances that may cross or affect the property
Obtain PLSS records (original plats and field notes) if the property is referenced to the PLSS
Compile all evidence to prepare for field work

Common wrong path — "constructive notice of recorded = knowledge of everything." Constructive notice is a legal fiction: the law treats a subsequent purchaser as knowing about properly recorded documents, even if they never actually looked at the records. But constructive notice only applies to documents in the chain of title for the specific property. Documents recorded elsewhere — outside the property's chain — do not give constructive notice to purchasers of this property, even if they are technically in the public record. An easement recorded against Parcel A's earlier owner, but recorded in a way that doesn't connect to Parcel B's chain, may not give constructive notice to Parcel B's buyer. Exam questions sometimes test this by describing a recorded but "stray" document (recorded in wrong parcel's file, indexed incorrectly, or outside the chain by predating the relevant conveyance) and asking whether a subsequent purchaser had constructive notice. The answer is often no — recording alone is not enough; the record must be properly indexed and connected to the chain of title.

Quick retrieval check — try before reading on.

▶In 1980, Grantor X recorded an easement across Parcel A in favor of a utility company. In 1985, X subdivided Parcel A into Parcels A1 and A2 and sold A2 to Buyer. Buyer's title search discovered no easement (the indexing was defective). Is Buyer bound by the easement under the constructive-notice doctrine?

Probably not — at least not under constructive notice. Constructive notice requires a document to be properly recorded and indexed in the chain of title the subsequent purchaser is actually searching. A recording that is mis-indexed, filed in the wrong parcel's records, or otherwise disconnected from the chain of title may fail to provide constructive notice — the purchaser who performs a reasonable title search would not find it.

However, the buyer may still be bound by inquiry notice if there is physical evidence on the ground (e.g., visible utility infrastructure) that would prompt a reasonable person to investigate. And the easement may still be enforceable against the buyer in other ways (such as an implied or prescriptive easement based on long-standing use) even if constructive notice fails. The bottom line: constructive notice requires proper recording in the chain of title; a defectively indexed document may not provide it, even though it is technically in the public record.

Grantor-Grantee Index

Most counties maintain records indexed by grantor (seller) and grantee (buyer). To search:

Forward search (grantor index): Start with a known owner and trace forward to find who they conveyed to
Backward search (grantee index): Start with the current owner and trace backward to find who conveyed to them

Tract index: Some counties maintain a tract index organized by parcel location rather than by parties' names. This is more efficient for surveyors but not universally available.

Exam Tips

Constructive notice means the law treats you as knowing about a recorded document even if you never searched the records
The chain of title traces ownership from the sovereign (government) to the present owner
Race-notice is the most common recording statute: the subsequent buyer must be in good faith, without notice, and record first
Surveyors must research adjoining parcels, not just the subject parcel, to understand boundary relationships
PLSS original plats and field notes are available from the BLM General Land Office (GLO) records
The FS exam may test your understanding of notice types, recording systems, or the types of documents found in public records
Always trace the chain of title backward from the current owner to understand how the property was created
Corner Records (required in California and a handful of other western states; not universal) document the condition and location of survey monuments

FS Exam Preparation

Module 1: Surveying Processes & Methods

Module 2: Mapping Processes & Methods

Module 3: Boundary Law & Real Property

Module 4: Surveying Principles & Geodesy

Module 5: Survey Computations

Module 6: Business Concepts

Module 7: Applied Math & Statistics