In Geneva, the identity of a building’s owner and its descriptive status can be consulted free of charge, online, without having to justify anything. Everything else — a certified extract, an attestation, a search carried out by the office — costs 50 francs and, depending on the data requested, requires a legitimate interest.
Here is precisely what you can obtain, how, and at what price.
What you can consult free of charge
Article 27 of the ordinance on the land registry gives the public, 24 hours a day, online access to two pieces of information about a given building:
- the descriptive status of the building — its designation, surface area, nature;
- the identity of the owner(s).
This is free and immediate. Three limits are clearly stated by the office: this data has no public faith value — it does not carry legal evidentiary weight; it does not take into account entries currently being processed; and it is in principle updated weekly. Finally, the system is protected against bulk consultation: querying the registry address by address requires justifying an interest.
What requires justifying an interest
Beyond this freely accessible data, Article 970 paragraph 1 of the Civil Code requires justifying an interest to consult or obtain an extract. This is the point most people discover too late.
Those who may claim a legal or economic interest worthy of protection include: the owner, the holder of a limited real right, the person who benefits from a title of acquisition, and the prospective buyer. The office is explicit about what does not suffice: “commercial canvassing or mere curiosity cannot constitute a sufficient interest”.
In plain terms: knowing who owns the villa across the street is free and lawful. Obtaining details of its easements, mortgages, or an attestation of non-registration requires a reason the office will accept.
Obtaining a certified extract: how and at what cost
Certified services can be ordered online only. The office does not accept any order by email, fax or telephone. You may go to the counter, but you will be asked to fill in the online form there. Extracts are, in principle, issued by email or by post.
The fee is set by the regulation on fees (REmORFDIT), Articles 7 and 8:
- 50 francs per certified attestation or extract;
- 50 francs per quarter of an hour for a consultation requiring the assistance of an office staff member, or for any specific search.
Worth knowing: certain data relating to a given building can be obtained as a certified extract without justifying an interest, under Article 970 paragraph 2 of the Civil Code. The obligation to justify an interest applies only to the other data.
Land publications, also free of charge
Property acquisitions are subject to a publication, freely and openly accessible, updated in principle every Friday. This is a separate source from consulting the registry, open to the public — and it too is protected against bulk queries.
Where to apply
Land Registry Office (ORF)
Rue des Gazomètres 5-7, 1205 Geneva
Case postale 69, 1211 Geneva 8
Telephone: +41 22 546 61 58
Email: registre.foncier@etat.ge.ch
Counter open Monday to Friday, from 9.00am to 12.00pm and 2.00pm to 4.00pm.
What an extract actually contains
An extract is not a descriptive sheet: it is the building’s folio, and it reads in four sections. The designation comes first — plot number, municipality, surface area, nature of the land and buildings located on it. Then ownership: who holds it, on what basis, and in what shares if there are several owners. Then the easements — right of way, building restrictions, distance and view easements — which attach to the property and will be binding on you. Finally, the mortgage charges: registered mortgage notes, their nominal amount and their ranking.
This last section often comes as a surprise. The amount of a registered mortgage note is not the debt: it is the ceiling of the charge. A note of 2 million may secure only a loan of 800,000 francs, or nothing at all. What the extract tells you is how much the building can be encumbered by, not how much it actually is.
Registration establishes ownership, not the signature
This is the point the land registry changes in a sale, and it is widely misunderstood. Article 656 paragraph 1 of the Civil Code is clear: “Registration in the land registry is required for the acquisition of ownership of land.” Signing the deed at the notary’s office does not make you the owner. Registration does.
Article 972 sets out the mechanism: real rights arise, take their rank and receive their date through registration in the main register, and the effect of that registration dates back to the moment it was entered in the journal. The journal is the entry register: as soon as the notary lodges the requisition there, your rank is secured, even if processing in the main register follows later. If two buyers claim the same property, it is the order in the journal that decides.
Practical consequence: there is a window between signing and registration. It is short, but it explains why the notary holds the funds and only releases them once the lodging has taken place. It also explains the rule set out in Article 971: a right subject to registration exists as a real right only if registration has taken place. An easement that has been promised but never registered does not protect you.
Land registry and cadastre: two different things
Many enquiries fail because people knock on the wrong door. The land registry establishes rights. The cadastre and official surveying establish geometry: where the boundary runs, what the exact shape of the plot is, which building occupies it. In Geneva, this mapping data can be consulted freely, and it is not the land registry office you should ask for it.
If your question is “who owns it”, that is the land registry. If it is “how far does my land extend”, that is the surveying office. And if it is “what can I build on it”, that is somewhere else again: the zoning, the utilisation index, the localised plans. We have brought these together in the five laws that can block a Geneva plot.
What the land registry will not tell you
The land registry establishes rights: who owns what, and what easements and mortgages encumber it. It says nothing about value. An extract will tell you neither what the property is worth today, nor what the neighbours actually got for their sale.
This is precisely the work we do. We track transactions registered on Geneva’s Left Bank, municipality by municipality, and we make them readable: the transactions map shows what has sold around an address, and “how much your neighbour sold for” answers the question the registry leaves open.
If your aim is to gauge a property’s position before selling or buying, an estimate based on actual transactions will tell you more than a 50-franc extract.