The land register is an official record of the rights pertaining to plots of land. These rights encompass ownership, easements, encumbrances and liens. The constitution, amendment, assignment and cancellation of these rights are effected via entries in the land register. In certain cases, personal rights such as purchase, pre-emptive and repurchase rights, or lease and tenancy agreements, may be included in the land register.

Organisation

The federal government is the supervisory authority for the land registry system. However, there is no central land register for the entire country. The cantons are responsible for establishing their land registry offices, for defining the region covered by each land register and for the management of each register. They are authorised to charge fees for entries in the land register, and in the majority of cantons the assignment of property and the establishment of mortgages are subject to a legal transaction tax.

Depending on the canton, land registers are either kept in paper form or, to an increasing extent, in electronic form.

Land registers record landownership details and comprise the following components:

• Main register, in which each plot of land is allocated a number and its own sheet (i.e. one sheet per plot of land)
  
• Logbook
• Plans based on the cadastral survey
• Auxiliary registers (ownership register, creditors register
• Receipts

The recording of plots of land in accordance with the federal legal provisions governing the land register – which is often referred to in short form as the federal land register – occurs on the basis of cadastral surveying plans. The term «plot of land» encompasses the property itself together with independent and permanent rights (e.g. building rights, resource rights), and co-ownership shares.

The cited federal legal provisions governing the land register have not yet been implemented in all cantons. Thus there are still some cantonal land registers to which not all the impacts of the federal land register apply.

Public nature of the land register

Some sections of the land register are publicly accessible.

• Anyone may receive the following information without having to demonstrate a specific interest:
  
  • Designation and description of a plot of land
  • Name(s) and identity/ies of the owner(s)
  • Form of ownership
  • Date of acquisition
  • Easements and encumbrances
  • Certain remarks.
• In addition, anyone who is able to demonstrate a plausible interest is entitled to inspect the land register in order to obtain other information (e.g. regarding mortgages), or request an extract containing the desired information.

Claiming to have no knowledge of an entry in the land register is not accepted as a valid objection in a dispute.

 The cantons may publish details of land purchase (with certain restrictions), e.g. in their local gazette or on the Internet.