There is good news and bad news for consumers worried about the amount of data being collected about them in their real estate transactions: The good news is there is a national task force at work to determine just how much of that data should be made available to the public.

The bad news is that the task force is no where near having a recommendation.

In fact, almost every state and county in the nation is looking at the problem of what exactly is "public information" and who is entitled to see it.

While clearly real estate agents, title companies, lenders and insurers may have just cause to see to how much is being paid for a home, what the previous price was, how large a loan is being carried and other bits of information, at issue is how you separate those legitimate users from telemarketers and direct mailers who have products to sell.

"I wish I could say we're close, but the truth is we're not," said Milt Valera, president of the National Notary Association and member of the Property Records Industry's joint task force on public information.

"Every time we think we've come up with something, three more people pop up and say 'Well, what about this or that,' and we have to go right back to the drawing boards.

"The problem is that the technology can do so much. And it's being developed faster than the laws can be developed."

Historically property records have been "public information" so that anyone could see how much an individual paid for a house, who the property was owned by, and how much was owed.

As a practical matter, however, the nation's 3,600 County Recorders have jealously guarded that data, deflecting the merely nosy from those with legitimate interests.

With the advent of the Internet, however, and the move toward electronic gathering of information, those unofficial safeguards are going by the wayside.

Valera assures that today it is still impossible for critical documents to be easily accessed by any itinerant Internet surfer, but he conceded that assurance may not last too much longer.

Legislatures are not close to coming up with solutions.

Washington County, Minn., for example, has passed a law allowing individuals to put their property records on a "shield list." Companies wanting to purchase information from the County Recorder must fill out an application stating what they intend to use it for. Almost 35 percent of taxpayers have asked that their information be shielded.

Arizona also has taken some steps to guard information about police officers, but that law has drawn protests from people who also want to be shielded.

Valera insists that information should be easily accessible to the public, but concedes there "are going to be some bumpy times" ahead in deciding what information is public and what is not.

He suggested other states may follow California's lead.

"(California) tried to come up with a definiation of 'electronic transaction,' but every time I went to a meeting some new issue came up. What we ended up doing was introducing general legislation that said we can go ahead and work on protecting information in electronic transactions - without defining what they were."

Published: April 7, 2000

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