My impression is that it mostly occurs at the registration stage, with the same property sold 2 or 3 times on forged documents - is this correct, or are there other versions? Is it something that will automatically be picked up by a competent lawyer, or is it more sophisticated than this? Any information appreciated.
If you search back in the archives of the national paper Diario Libre from September 2005 to around January 2006 you'll find an investigation they did. The area was Bavaro, but subsequently they found instances of the same thing in Santiago and other areas. The Land Registry was issuing duplicate titles: the 'mafia' consisted of a corrupt Land Registry official, some lawyers and some realtors. One family was selling a piece of land which had been in the family for 50 years. It only came to light when purchaser's lawyer did the searches and discovered that as well as the '50 year family', title was also issued in the name of someone else. The 50 year family only became aware of this when they came to sell.
As more and more cases were unearthed this prompted me to do a search on my title (not using the services of a lawyer) just in case my title had 'changed hands' unbeknownst to me and I was now living in a house situated on land owned by one (or more!) other people. It hadn't, I was OK but it was an interesting exercise in itself.
In order for the 'mafia' to work the Registrar had to be in on it. They did prosecute some of the lawyers & realtors involved but the Registrar took early retirement in order to write poetry...........
So to answer your question, this doesn't just happen at registration stage. It can happen at any time. Some of these titles changed hands 3 times in a 24 hour period. I've let it be known that I'll be running a title search on my title every 3 years or so - for the few hundred pesos taxes/stamps which it costs if you do it yourself, it is well worth it. Just takes a bit of time. I wouldn't advise trying it yourself for new people; you need to have Spanish & be familiar with the workings of the Land Registry. Better to use a trusted lawyer. And it's a good idea to spend a lot of time looking for a
really trusted lawyer. But for long term residents/owners I would recommend it. Mainly because it gets the message out that you are keeping tabs on your own title & by doing your own search you have eliminated one possibility for corruption i.e. the lawyer.
And just in case anyone is wondering, the Land Registry didn't know I was searching my own title. I was concerned I'd get a 'Dominican optimism' response if they knew this - 'of course it's ok, it's your own title'. Fortunately my partner & I have different surnames so I was able to search using his ID which made it look as if it was a search prior to a purchase, rather than a search of my own title in order to uncover a land registry mafia.
