Rectification of boundary and surface area records in the land registry

The records regarding the boundaries and surface area of lands eligible for private ownership in the land registry shall be determined based on an official cadastral survey. Inaccuracies in the plan boundary and the surface area registered in the land registry lead to various negative consequences for the state, society, and individuals, such as the loss of rightful ownership, the state's responsibility for maintaining the land registry, and the failure of the geographical information systems infrastructure to provide the expected benefits. There also arises a hidden tension between property law and cadastral legislation due to the determination and rectification of the boundaries and surface area of lands based on official cadastral surveys. In this study, the determination of the boundaries and surface area of lands eligible for private ownership and their rectification in the land registry are analyzed based on whether the lands were previously registered in the land registry and whether they were subject to official cadastral surveys. The technical nature of the concepts of boundary and surface area, as well as the full complexity of errors in other records in the land registry, require different provisions and approaches to be followed in the rectification process for boundaries and surface areas that do not comply with the facts. In this respect, this study aims to contribute to the literature by examining the methods of rectifying the land registry as stipulated in the Turkish Civil Code and other regulations in the Cadastral Law, such as updating cadastral maps, digitization, and error correction, while also revealing their interrelations.