Examine documentation such as mortgages, liens, judgments, easements, plat books, maps, contracts, and agreements to verify factors such as properties' legal descriptions, ownership, or restrictions.

“Examine documentation such as mortgages, liens, judgments, easements, plat books, maps, contracts, and agreements to verify factors such as properties' legal descriptions, ownership, or restrictions.” is a core task performed by Title Examiners, Abstractors, and Searchers. Among the occupation's 17 rated tasks, workers place it 17th by importance (#1 most important). About 100% of workers say it is relevant to their job.

This is a single occupation-specific task statement from O*NET. The figures below describe how central the task is to the job and what independent studies measure about AI and this kind of work — not a prediction that the task will be automated.

Work activities this task rolls up to

O*NET groups concrete tasks into broader work activities shared across many occupations.

• Consult legal materials or public records. in Getting Information

AI exposure

The OpenAI / Eloundou “GPTs are GPTs” study rates this task E2. Exposure with tools — software built on top of a language model (not the model alone) could cut the time by at least half.

Exposure measures whether a model could meaningfully speed the task up — it is an estimate of overlap with model capabilities, not a measure of whether the work will be done by software. The study's intermediate score (β) for this task is 0.50. Automation potential label: T3.

Other tasks in this occupation

• Examine individual titles to determine if restrictions, such as delinquent taxes, will affect titles and limit property use. · importance 4.6
• Prepare reports describing any title encumbrances encountered during searching activities and outlining actions needed to clear titles. · importance 4.6
• Copy or summarize recorded documents, such as mortgages, trust deeds, and contracts, that affect property titles. · importance 4.5
• Verify accuracy and completeness of land-related documents accepted for registration, preparing rejection notices when documents are not acceptable. · importance 4.5
• Prepare lists of all legal instruments applying to a specific piece of land and the buildings on it. · importance 4.4
• Prepare and issue title commitments and title insurance policies, based on information compiled from title searches. · importance 4.3
• Read search requests to ascertain types of title evidence required and to obtain descriptions of properties and names of involved parties. · importance 4.2
• Obtain maps or drawings delineating properties from company title plants, county surveyors, or assessors' offices. · importance 4.2
• Confer with realtors, lending institution personnel, buyers, sellers, contractors, surveyors, and courthouse personnel to exchange title-related information or to resolve problems. · importance 4.2
• Enter into record-keeping systems appropriate data needed to create new title records or to update existing ones. · importance 4.0
• Direct activities of workers who search records and examine titles, assigning, scheduling, and evaluating work, and providing technical guidance as necessary. · importance 4.0
• Retrieve and examine real estate closing files for accuracy and to ensure that information included is recorded and executed according to regulations. · importance 4.0
• Determine whether land-related documents can be registered under the relevant legislation, such as the Land Titles Act. · importance 3.6
• Assess fees related to registration of property-related documents. · importance 3.4

See all tasks on the Title Examiners, Abstractors, and Searchers page.

Sources for this page

Every figure above traces to a named public dataset and the exact release below — not hand-written opinion. See the full methodology for what each measure does and does not mean.

• O*NET 30.3 U.S. Department of Labor / National Center for O*NET Development
• “GPTs are GPTs” (Eloundou et al.) arXiv 2303.10130 OpenAI / academic

Data compiled June 2, 2026. Figures are estimates, not advice.

@misc{singulariki-task-9231,
  title  = {Examine documentation such as mortgages, liens, judgments, easements, plat books, maps, contracts, and agreements to verify factors such as properties' legal descriptions, ownership, or restrictions.},
  author = {{Singulariki}},
  year   = {2026},
  note   = {O*NET 30.3; “GPTs are GPTs” (Eloundou et al.) arXiv 2303.10130. Accessed June 7, 2026},
  url    = {https://singulariki.com/tasks/task-9231}
}