Monument Fee Collection

Effective January 1, 2011

The staff of the Clerk-Recorder-Assessor's Office are forbidden by California legal codes to practice law or provide legal advice; this prohibition includes giving advice about what forms you might need or how you should fill them out.

Government Code section 27585 authorizes the Survey Monument Fee, in order to finance the Survey Monument Preservation Fund to pay the necessary expenses incurred or authorized by the county surveyor in any retracement or remonument survey of major historical land division lines upon which later surveys are based (Government Code section 27584). The County Surveyor administers the fund.

The fee is $10.00 and will apply to Grant Deeds. It does not include:

Quit Claim Deed

Tax Deed Reconveyance

Deed Decree of Distribution

Judgment of Partition

Deed of Trust Easement Deed

Deed changing vesting (ie: community property to joint tenancy, or to your own trust)

Correction Deed Re-Recorded Deed

Exceptions to the Fee Include:

Grant Deeds conveying lots created by recorded tract (subdivision) map

Grant Deed conveying real property from any public agency

Grant Deed conveying real property to any public agency

The only exempt legal descriptions are a reference to a full parcel created by a recorded Subdivision/Tract map or reference to a condominium unit

Examples of legal description that are NOT exempt:

Parcel created by a recorded Record of Survey Map

Parcel created by a recorded Parcel Map

Portion of a parcel created by a recorded Subdivision Map (including exceptions from described parcels)

U. S. Government Survey (Township & Range)

Metes and Bounds

Street address

Omnibus description (ie: all property located in Sonoma County)

Generic description (ie: the Norton Ranch)

NOTE: In the absence of a clear description the Recorder's Office will assume that a fee is due.

Example: "Lot 4 on Recorded Map 143 at Page 37, Sonoma County Records"