(Seguin) — The Guadalupe County Clerk’s Office is helping the public take a stand against property fraud. It’s a growing problem, and the clerk’s office has some new tools that will help the public inform itself about any potential issues.
Guadalupe County Clerk Teresa Kiel says the new online records management program will allow people to customize alerts that will help to keep them informed about a particular piece of property.
“One of the most important features that I want the citizens of Guadalupe County County to know is that we have a property alert program that is free of charge to them. They can go to the site. It’s guadalupe.tx.publicsearch.us. They can go to the site input information — their name or a property address and then search up the record” said Kiel.
Kiel says once you’re on the website, it’s easy to search for the records that you want to find. She says you then will have the opportunity to utilize some of the other features offered through the site.
“When they find a record, they’ll see a shield in the upper right hand corner that says property alert. If they click on that, it will ask them to register their e-mail address and then they can be signed up (for alerts) for their name or a property description, so that if documents are filed within our office, they will be notified of those documents. They’ll be notified by e-mail. There’s a lot of property fraud going on throughout the United States right now, and we’ve been trying to find the best program available for our people so that it wouldn’t cost them anything or be very costly to the county. We think we found a good one,” said Kiel.
Kiel says property fraud cases have been on the rise nationally, and she thinks this will help arm people with the information that they need to protect themselves and their property. She says this service is already commercially available, but she says she wanted her office to be able to offer a free version directly to the public.
“There is a company out there called (Home) Title Lock. I’m sure people have heard the commercials for it. That is a service that you sign up for and it only provides the name search and it is very costly. But we’re offering the same type of service and even more benefits for free,” said Kiel.
The site offers users a tour of the services to make it easier to navigate. Kiel says they are also available to help answer any questions about the new free service.
“If they have any problems locating it or getting signed up, they can give us a call at the county clerk’s Office at 830-303-4188, ext 1239,” said Kiel.
Again, the records search and the property fraud alerts can be found at guadalupe.tx.publicsearch.us.