Registrar-Generals-Department-Annual-report-1967-1968 — Page 15

provides that all such deeds, etc., so registered shall have priority according to the priority of their respective dates of registration, and that with the exception of bona fide leases at rack rents for any term not exceeding three years, all such deeds, etc., which are not registered shall, as against any subsequent bona fide purchaser or mortgagee for valuable consideration, be absolutely null and void. No notice, actual or constructive, of any prior unregistered instrument affects the priority of any duly registered instrument. Where, however, deeds etc. are regis- tered within on month of execution, if executed in the Colony, or, if executed elsewhere, within twelve months of execution, they take priority according to the respective dates thereof. Legally the system is one of registration of deeds and not of title; but in view of the above provisions instruments relating to land are always registered promptly after execu- tion, and the Land Registers show the devolution of title to each prop- erty and all incumbrances on it.

23. Table IV shows the number of instruments registered in each year since 1958-59; Table V, the numbers of instruments by categories in each year since 1963-64; and Table VI, the total considerations in the principal categories for each year since 1958-59.

24. 43,303 instruments were registered in 1967-68, 6,279 (12.7%) less than the 1966-67 total, and the lowest figure since 1963-64. The figures given in Table V show decreases compared with 1966-67 in all the major categories of instruments except mortgages and reassignments. Assignments fell by 1,555 (7.5%) below the 1966-67 record total to 19,300. Of these, 518 were assignments of whole lots, sections or sub- sections, and 18,782 assignments of undivided shares in land coupled with the right to use one or more units in the building erected thereon.

25. With the decrease in the number of assignments the total of the considerations mentioned therein dropped by $267,796,000 (22.8%) to $908,951,000, of which $788,695,000 represents the total considerations in assignments of undivided shares. Dividing this last total by 19,654, the number of units affected by the 18,782 assignments of undivided shares, one gets an average consideration of about $40,200 for trans- actions of this type as against $45,200 in the previous year and $48,800 in the year before last. This decrease is no doubt due in part to the existence of a buyers' market, but may also to some extent be due to a trend towards providing smaller and cheaper flats.

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