2 Abstract of Title

The Abstract of Title is a summary of all legal actions pertaining to the property. The information contained in the Abstract is most useful for tracing owners of the property and for constructing a history of the land parcel on which the house is situated. Occasionally, abstracts will have information about structures on the site. The abstract does not refer to an actual document, but instead refers to a list, or index, onto which the original documents were copied verbatim by the County Recorder. The abstract is held by the titleholder (either the home owner or the bank). If an abstract is in the bank’s possession, it may be borrowed for a limited time to allow copying of the earliest entries plus those around the construction date and any names with the corresponding date that appear frequently.