Reading a Texas County Index

The index is where every title search begins. Reading it well means knowing which book a citation lives in, what an abstract search does and does not return, and what a prior reference is telling you.

Record series

Texas counties historically kept separate books: Deed Records (DR), Deed of Trust Records (DT), Oil and Gas Lease Records, and later a consolidated Official Public Records (OPR). A citation is a series plus a volume and page — or, for newer filings, an instrument number. DR 244/240 and OPR 244/240 are different instruments.

Searching by abstract

Most county systems let you search instruments indexed to a survey's abstract number. An abstract search returns what the clerk indexed to that abstract — which is not everything on the land. Deeds indexed under a subdivision or city block, and instruments with no legal description entered, will not appear.

Searching by party

Grantor and grantee searches find instruments by name regardless of legal description. They return everything that party did in the county, including parcels you do not care about. The discipline is to read the legal description, acreage and prior reference on each row before adding it to the chain.

Reading a row

Prior reference — the volume/page of the instrument under which the grantor took title. Follow it before searching by name.
Acreage and legal description — the tract identity. Match them to the tract you are running.
Instrument type and remarks — "WD", "DT", "REL", "OGL", "WDVL" (warranty deed with vendor's lien). A release names what it releases.
Reported vs captured count — if the site says 361 rows and you captured 300, your search is truncated; do not certify from it.

Paid documents

The index is usually free; the instrument image is often paid. Decide what to buy from the index, keep the receipt, and never buy the same document twice.

In TitleDesk

Abstract and party searches are captured with their reported and captured counts, rows are read for series, prior reference and acreage, paid retrieval happens only inside the assignment's budget with one receipt per document, and a truncated capture blocks delivery. Texas mineral title.

Bring your assignment, recorded instruments and client format. TitleDesk brings the research, source pages, runsheet, ownership calculations and report package into one workspace, so you can spend more time examining title and serving your clients. Download TitleDesk or talk to Spencer.

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Reading a Texas county index