[mindslight]

> before whatever event happens that might trigger a lawsuit

I'll accept that interpretation. But that's still just a patch over the underlying semantics trying to eliminate a lot of thorny cases, not a full change in semantics.

For example, let's say 12/31 is a Sunday. The seller wishes to sell the property this year for tax purposes. The seller executes the purchase agreement and the deed on 12/31, and then only records the deed on 1/2 (when the registry reopens). For purpose of taxes, that is still treated as a sale in the earlier year, right?

> My question would be, how does a closing work in jurisdictions that have Torrens title? Does the closing have to take place at the land registry, so they can confirm that everything is checked and valid and recorded before I get the key to the house?

I have no idea. It seems like the main difference with Torrens title is that when the deed is accepted by the registry then you know it is authoritative. So a closing at an attorney's office with delayed recording has the same ambiguity under both systems. The difference would be that when the deed is confirmed recorded under Torrens, that ambiguity has been fully resolved. Whereas under non-Torrens that ambiguity hangs around indefinitely, insured against by title insurance, and eventually [mostly] extinguished by adverse possession.

[pdonis]

> For purpose of taxes, that is still treated as a sale in the earlier year, right?

To the best of my knowledge, yes, the date of closing, which is the date on which the deed is executed, is the date of sale for tax purposes. Note, however, that at least in the US, the IRS doesn't check what you claim the date of sale is unless you are audited, and I never have been. What would happen in an audit under your hypothetical, I can't say.

> a closing at an attorney's office with delayed recording has the same ambiguity under both systems.

Yes, that's why I asked if such a closing is even allowed under a Torrens system--it seems like it would defeat a key purpose of the system, which is to make sure that the land registry's records always are the "single source of truth" for who owns what.

[mindslight]

I've actually personally dealt with a state's tax authority for a situation where the transfer date was significant, and it was never questioned.

> which is to make sure that the land registry's records always are the "single source of truth" for who owns what.

I think you're coming at this from a tech perspective of fully authoritative digital databases a little too much. Look at the ambiguity that remains after a non-Torrens transfer, and after a Torrens transfer. Eliminating that is the main point of Torrens title. It still can't solve the entire problem and be a "single source of truth" the way we see things in the tech world.

That Florida statute would seem to eliminate a good chunk of that ambiguity as well, but not all.

[pdonis]

The IRS is Federal, not state. State tax codes are generally much easier to comprehend. But to describe the US Federal tax code as Byzantine would be to give too much credit for obfuscation to the Byzantines. :-) That's why it's so hard to predict what the IRS would do in the case of an audit (and why there is a thriving industry of tax preparers who claim, with varying degrees of justification, to be able to help you navigate the system).

[mindslight]

That's a weird tangential rant. There is a difference between tax codes and general principles of accounting. I feel pretty confident that if a state tax authority agrees with the deed date being the transfer date, then the IRS would as well.

Also no, state tax codes can be pretty complex as well. On this particular issue, I had trouble finding an attorney who would represent me for less than $10k (while still equivocating about the merits of my position!), so I represented myself. It took a twenty minute phone call with two state tax agents to come to an amicable agreement. A++ would get taxed again.

I've previously been one to echo negative sentiment about government bureaucracy, but the times I've had to deal with it (not the IRS thankfully but rather a few other federal agencies) the agents have been generally helpful and empowered to act authoritatively. They're still part of a bureaucracy of course, with some of the laughable things that entails, but ultimately still human beings with some leeway to act.

For the most part I think the negative narrative has been informed by corporate bureaucracies getting really bad (IVRs, offshoring, bottomless ticket systems, now LLMs, etc) and so we're all assuming that the government simply must be worse. But it's not. (well maybe it is now after the DOGE arsonists brought so-called "corporate efficiency", I don't actually know)

[pdonis]

> general principles of accounting.

I'm not sure what those have to do with this question, since it's a legal question, not an accounting question.

> I feel pretty confident that if a state tax authority agrees with the deed date being the transfer date, then the IRS would as well.

In many cases a state tax authority wouldn't even be involved, since many states don't tax capital gains (which is what would be involved with a home sale) while the US Federal government does.

> negative sentiment about government bureaucracy

Evidently your experiences with government bureaucracies have been very, very different from mine.

[mindslight]

This turned very argumentative very fast. I had thought we were having an amicable discussion about the semantics of real estate titles.

I mentioned my experience with a state tax authority because it is direct personal experience about this very topic. I don't know why you turned that into being about the IRS, and are now even seemingly rejecting the state tax authority "being involved". The date of the transfer was directly relevant to my disagreement with the state tax authority, and they didn't question that date being the deed date even though the recording happened some time later. Either believe me or not, I don't care.

> Evidently your experiences with government bureaucracies have been very, very different from mine.

Sure? I'm not saying they were a some pleasant, responsive, quick, and casual experience - rather much less bad than I was expecting. And dealing with some corporate bureaucracies has been much worse, with constant transferring and calling back every week to check on status and make sure a ticket didn't get stuck and timeout, etc.