Personal property registry hits web in May
Richard Gleeson
Northern News Services
Yellowknife (Apr 20/01) - Finding out whether the person selling you a used car owns all of it will soon be as easy as bellying up to a computer and pressing a few buttons.
Currently finding that information requires a trip to the registry office at the Stuart Hodgson Building, more than a little inconvenient for those in Nunavut.
The Yellowknife registry is a repository for documents that show financing -- loans and mortgages -- registered against personal property in the eastern and western territory.
The registry is about to enter a three-year transition to a new system that will allow people to search and register claims against property using the Internet.
"The big difference is under the old document registry system you brought in an actual copy of the agreement to our office," registrar Tom Hall said.
"With the new system you don't actually register a document, but just file a notice to say you have an interest in the property."
Notices do not include the amount or terms of the loan or mortgage registered against the property, but the institution or individual that holds the loan must provide that information if asked.
Hall said the new system give the public faster access to the same information available today.
Typically, the registry is used most often by banks registering loans or mortgages against property and lawyers doing title searches.
Access to the personal property registry will be available Monday to Saturday through Atlantic Canada On-Line, a public private partnership between the four Atlantic provinces and Unisys Canada.
Those who need to access it must pay a one-time fee of $200 for a software bundle, plus the current $5 fee for each search.
During the transition period, because some documents will be registered under the old system and others under the new system, title searches should be done on both the old and new, Hall said.
The new system applies to all property, except real estate, that can be used as security for a loan or mortgage. It officially goes into operation May 7, when the Northwest Territories new Personal Property Securities Act comes into effect. From that point on all new loans or mortgages against personal property will be registered electronically.
Searches will be easier on the new registry. Currently, all documents are registered by the last name of the person who holds the property. The electronic system will allow searching by a number of other criteria, including vehicle serial numbers.
For the foreseeable future title searches of real property will have to be done at the registry office.
An on-line real property registry is "obviously something we'd like to do ... but the Personal Property Service Act has kind of taken priority at this point," Hall said.
