Arizona to Require Counties to Alert Owners When Document Recorded Against Property

April 18, 2023

Arizona passed a bill that requires county recorders to provide a system for notifying property owners when a document is recorded against their property. 

SB 1110 specifies that the system is voluntary on the part of property owners and must be implemented by Jan. 1, 2025. The property owner must opt in to receive notifications, which could include email, text message or other similar means.

The bill states the cost to county recorders depends upon their current technological and personnel capacity. Counties with a highly automated system of storing records would likely have one-time costs to develop an electronic or phone-based notification system. Counties without a highly automated system might have ongoing personnel costs to review records to comply with any such requests for notification pursuant to the bill.

Pinal and Yavapai counties already have a notification system in place, while Maricopa County is in the process of implementing a notification system. It’s reported Maricopa County is spending $50,000 in one-time start-up costs and $20,000 in ongoing expenditures for its system. Arizona has 15 counties.

City attorneys' offices of San Diego and San Francisco have issued a subpoena for information from Home Title Lock they allege uses deceptive advertising to convince homeowners to purchase unnecessary home title monitoring services.

“Home Title Lock is a scam, plain and simple,” said San Francisco City Attorney Chiu. “The company has manufactured a “home title theft” crisis to stir up fear amongst elderly homeowners and deceive them into buying a service that many local governments provide for free. False identity theft scares, like those created by Home Title Lock, take attention away from important privacy and data security efforts. We are seeking further information to understand how many California homeowners may have been harmed by these misleading advertisements.”


Contact ALTA at 202-296-3671 or communications@alta.org.