Land Registry fees when you buy a home in Ireland

When you buy a home, two things get registered: you as the owner, and the lender's mortgage against the home. Tailte Éireann charges a fee for each. Your solicitor pays them and passes them on as outlays. This guide explains what is registered, which fees apply, the searches that go with them, and how long it takes.

Who Tailte Éireann is

Tailte Éireann is the State body that keeps Ireland's property registers. It was formed in 2023 by merging the Property Registration Authority, Ordnance Survey Ireland and the Valuation Office. People still say "the Land Registry", and the name is still used for the main register. The glossary has the other names you will meet.

It runs two registers:

• The Land Registry. A record of who owns each registered piece of land, with a map. The State guarantees the title. Most homes are on it.
• The Registry of Deeds. An older system that records documents rather than ownership. Some older homes in cities are still on it.

When a home on the Registry of Deeds is sold, it usually has to move to the Land Registry. That is called first registration, and it takes longer.

What gets registered when you buy

Two things:

1. The transfer. You become the registered owner. Your name goes on the folio, which is the register's page for the home.
2. The charge. The lender's mortgage is registered as a charge on the folio. It stays there until the loan is paid off.

Your solicitor (check the Law Society's register) lodges both after closing. See the conveyancing solicitor page for the rest of the solicitor's work.

The fees

Tailte Éireann publishes a fee schedule. It sets:

• A fee to register the transfer, in bands by the price of the home. The band rises with the price.
• A flat fee to register the charge.
• Smaller fees for a copy of the folio, a copy of the map, and a first registration.

We do not print the figures here, because the schedule changes and the current one is on Tailte Éireann's fees page. Check it, or ask your solicitor for the exact amounts in the section 150 letter. In our costs list, the registration fees, the searches and the commissioner for oaths come to €400 to €1,200 in all, with €900 as a typical figure. That is a planning range, not a quote.

A worked example

Róisín and Tom are buying at €380,000 with a mortgage. Their solicitor's section 150 letter estimates the outlays:

The outlays sit beside the solicitor's fee of €2,000 plus VAT and the stamp duty of €3,800. The cost of buying calculator shows them on the one statement, and solicitor fees explains the fee itself.

The searches

Before closing, your solicitor runs searches to make sure nothing is registered against the home or the seller that could bind you. The usual ones:

• A planning search. Whether the home and any extension have planning permission and no enforcement notice.
• A judgment search. Whether there is a court judgment against the seller that could attach to the home.
• A bankruptcy search. Whether the seller is bankrupt.
• A Companies Office search. If the seller is a company, whether it is in good standing.
• A Land Registry or Registry of Deeds search. The current state of the title and any charges.

Each search has a small fee from the body that runs it. The solicitor passes them on at cost.

How long registration takes

You own the home from closing. Registration is the record catching up. For a home already on the Land Registry, a straightforward transfer and charge can take weeks. Where there is a query, longer.

A first registration, moving a home from the Registry of Deeds to the Land Registry, is slower. It can take many months, and sometimes more than a year. It does not affect your right to live in the home or your mortgage. The lender knows the timing and has your solicitor's undertaking to complete it.

You do not need to chase it. Your solicitor tells you when it is done. If you sell before it is complete, the solicitor handles the overlap.

Reading your folio

When registration is done, ask your solicitor for a copy of the folio. It has three parts:

• Part 1 describes the land, with a plan number that links to the map.
• Part 2 names the owner. After registration, that is you.
• Part 3 lists the burdens: the lender's charge, and any rights of way or conditions that bind the home.

Keep it with your deeds. When you come to sell, or to switch lender, the buyer's or the new lender's solicitor starts from the folio. Anyone can buy a copy of any folio from Tailte Éireann for a small fee, which is how a buyer's solicitor checks a seller's title.

What Land Registry fees are not

• Not stamp duty. Stamp duty is a tax paid to Revenue, 1% of the price up to €1 million. Stamp duty explained covers it.
• Not Local Property Tax. That is a yearly charge on owning a home.
• Not the solicitor's fee. The fee is for the solicitor's time. The outlays are money paid out to others.

Each is a separate line on the closing statement.

When the lender's charge comes off

When you pay off the mortgage, or switch to a new lender, the old charge is removed from the folio. The lender gives your solicitor a release, and it is lodged with Tailte Éireann. There is a fee for that too, on the same schedule. It is one of the costs of switching, beside the new lender's charge going on.

Where this leaves you

Ask your solicitor for the section 150 letter with the outlays listed, and check the figures against Tailte Éireann's current fee schedule. Put the outlays into the cost of buying calculator beside the fee, the duty and the rest. The first-time buyer journey shows where closing and registration fall, and get quotes finds a solicitor in your county.