New fees for title searches and caveats

New fees for title searches and caveats
The Star Penang 8/4/2005

The state government has reduced its proposed fees for property title searches and registration of caveats following a protest from the Penang Bar Committee.

The title search fees will be from RM20 to RM30 instead of the RM50 while the caveat fees will be increased from RM100 to RM150 instead of RM200.

The new fees will take effect on Monday. These increased fees among the higher fees proposed for land-related matters. The increase in the other fees took effect on March 28.

Chief Minister Tan Sri Dr Koh Tsu Koon said the new rates were necessary to reflect the actual cost of the procedures involved.

“Furthermore, there has not been any change in the rates since 1983,” he said. He was speaking to reporters yesterday after receiving a mock cheque for one million renminbi (RM450,000) from the Xiamen Red Cross Society for the TYT Disaster Fund for tsunami rehabilitation work.

Last month, the Penang Bar Committee submitted a memorandum to Dr Koh to protest against the proposed fee increase after lawyers received notices from the state Land and Mines Office of the the new rates.

Committee chairman V. Sitham-baram was quoted as saying that the increase was “unrealistic.” He said they should be affordable and not burden the public especially low-cost house buyers.

Dr Koh said the percentage of increase was high for some of the fees but was the actual sum in monetary terms was “not much.”

Citing the application fee for the change of land use as example, he said it only went up from RM100 to RM300 although it was a 200% increase.

“We have responded to the Bar Committee's memorandum but we cannot afford to accommodate all their proposals,” he said. Sithambaram said yesterday that the committee was grateful for the reduced rate of increase for title searches and caveat fees.

But he said he was unhappy that the other land-related fees had been increased by more than 50%. He said the Power of Attorney fee, for example, had been increased by 1,400% from RM2 to RM30. “We hope the state will consider a 50% increase for all the other fees,” he said.