Understanding the Difference in Your Property Searches
When searching for property history, two key fields can impact your results: Last Sale Date and Last Transfer Date. While they may seem similar, they capture different types of transactions—and choosing the right one ensures you get the most accurate results.
🔑 What Is Last Sale Date?
Last Sale Date reflects the most recent arms-length sale of a property.
This includes only traditional sales where:
A buyer and seller acted independently
The recorded sale amount was greater than $1,000
Because of this, properties with zero-dollar or nominal-dollar amounts are not counted as sales and will not appear when filtering by Last Sale Date.
Best used for:
✔ Market sales
✔ Comparable sales (CMAs)
✔ Traditional buyer–seller transactions
🔑 What Is Last Transfer Date?
Last Transfer Date captures all types of ownership changes, including:
Zero-dollar deeds
Family or intra-company transfers
Quitclaim deeds
Other non-arms-length transactions
Traditional sales
This makes it the more comprehensive option when you’re looking for any ownership change, regardless of sale price.
Best used for:
✔ Detecting any ownership update
✔ Researching deed activity
✔ Finding properties missing from “Last Sale Date” searches
💡 Which Should I Use?
If your goal is to find true market sales, use Last Sale Date.
If you need to see every ownership change, including zero-dollar or non-arms-length transactions, use Last Transfer Date.
🛠 If a Property Seems to Be Missing…
Try switching your search criteria:
In Advanced Search, replace Last Sale Date with Last Transfer Date
Rerun your search to include all deed activity
This will often reveal properties that do not appear under Sale Date due to their recorded transaction type.
If you still can’t locate a property or have questions about sale and transfer data, our support team is happy to help!