How to look up deeds, title and property records in Hawaiʻi

In Hawaiʻi, land records live in two different places. The State Bureau of Conveyances keeps the recorded documents (deeds, mortgages, releases, liens) for the whole state. Each county's real property tax office keeps the tax records: owner on the tax roll, assessed value, tax bills, and tax maps. The Honolulu tax office notes that the two are "under two different jurisdictions (State & County)."

1. The State Bureau of Conveyances (BOC)

The Bureau of Conveyances is part of DLNR. It records, indexes and digitizes Regular System and Land Court documents and maps, issues Land Court Certificates of Title, and certifies copies of recorded documents. The BOC says Hawaiʻi is one of two states with a single statewide recording system, so one office covers property on every island.

Office: Kalanimoku Building, 1151 Punchbowl St., Room 120, Honolulu, HI 96813 · (808) 587-0147 · Mail: P.O. Box 2867, Honolulu, HI 96803. Office hours are Monday–Friday, 7:45 a.m.–4:30 p.m., except State holidays. The Public Research/Reference Room (Room 123) is open 8:15 a.m.–3:30 p.m. The BOC warns that hours "can change on short notice" because of staffing (BOC FAQs).

2. Regular System vs. Land Court

The BOC says a property is in Land Court if it was registered with the State at some point since the 1900s; all other property is in the Regular System. Some documents carry labels in both corners. These are "Double System" documents that had to be recorded in both systems. A 1987 Legislative Reference Bureau study explains that the Land Court (Torrens) system was set up in 1903 by the Territorial Legislature. Land Court maps (and File Plans) can be searched on the State Land Survey Division's DAGS Map Search. For removing land from Land Court (Act 187, SLH 2021), see the Land Survey Division's Land Court & File Plan Mapping Guide.

3. Searching and ordering recorded documents online

• 1976 to today: use the BOC's RecordEASE document search & ordering site. Everyone has to create a free user account. Use the "Daily Purchases, Non-Subscriber Account" link, and your email address is your username. You can search for free by grantor/grantee name, TMK (format 1-1-1-111-111), Transfer Certificate of Title (TCT), document number or range, or recording date. Document previews are blurred and watermarked until you buy them.
• Cost online: $1 per page, paid by credit card (Visa, Mastercard, Discover, American Express), "and applicable service fees" TODO: verify — the service-fee amount isn't stated on the login page. Certified copies can be bought online and generally take 7–10 business days to process before they're mailed by USPS.
• Before 1976: research in person in the Public Reference Room (Room 123), or mail a written request with your contact info, the book & page, any other details (grantor/grantee, document type), whether you want it certified, a self-addressed stamped envelope, and a check payable to "Bureau of Conveyances." The BOC's FAQ and General Public pages list the cost as $35.00 per document plus a $10.00 processing fee. TODO: verify — the BOC Recording Fees page lists certified copies as $10.00 + $1.00/page + $10.00 processing, so confirm with the BOC which amount applies to a pre-1976 mail request.
• Useful document codes: D = Deed, AD = Apartment Deed, M = Mortgage, R = Release, NL = Notice of Lien, LCO = Land Court Order. The BOC says that to check whether a mortgage release was recorded, search by grantor/grantee name or document number and look for the document type "Release." (Recording the release is generally the lender's job.)
• Condominium maps: you can request digital copies online and the BOC says it delivers them electronically in 21–28 business days, subject to availability.
• Property Watch: a BOC email alert when a name you choose appears as a party in a newly recorded document. It is meant to help detect fraudulent recordings, but the BOC says it will not prevent them. Expect false matches on common names (details).

Don't know the document number? Look up the property on the county tax site (below). Honolulu's tax office says its property search shows the document number for deeds under the sales history. The BOC publishes step-by-step instructions for each county (BOC Resources page). If the number shown has a letter in front (a Land Court number), the BOC says to leave the letter off when you search. TODO: verify — the BOC's per-county instructions date from 2014–2016, and the column names they mention may have changed.

About "title": the BOC records documents but doesn't answer individual "how to" questions about ownership changes. It doesn't supply deed forms ("Hawaii is not a 'forms' state"), and it recommends an attorney or title/escrow company. A recorded deed in the Regular System is evidence of title, not a State guarantee. Only Land Court property has a State Certificate of Title.

4. County real property tax & assessment records

The BOC notes that each of Hawaiʻi's four counties runs its own real property tax. Name or address changes on a tax bill go to the county, not the BOC.

All four county search sites run on qPublic (Schneider Geospatial). Honolulu RPAD notes that its site has no information on mortgages or trust agreements; for those, use the BOC search.

5. Where TMK numbers come from

A Tax Map Key (TMK) is the parcel ID the counties use for property tax. The State's statewide parcel layer describes the 9-digit TMK as: Division/county (1 Oʻahu, 2 Maui, 3 Hawaiʻi, 4 Kauaʻi) · Zone · Section · Plat (3 digits) · Parcel (3 digits) (State metadata). Condominium (CPR) units get an extra 4-digit number on the county sites.

The counties draw the tax maps and assign the numbers. For example, Honolulu RPAD says that once a condominium (CPR) declaration is recorded at the BOC, it assigns TMKs to the units, usually about 2 months after recording. Maui's tax office has a Tax Maps section for new TMKs, and Hawaiʻi County publishes its TMK maps online. The BOC's recording rules ask that the first page of a document include the tax map key number, if possible. The State's merged parcel layer is not survey-grade: the boundaries weren't derived from metes and bounds.