Document Retrieval
The source documents themselves, without a report layer on top. Ordinances, plats, site plans, prior approvals, and amendment history — pulled from the record and delivered as a citable set.
How a retrieval runs
The hard part of this work is not knowing what to ask for. It is knowing who holds it, in what form, and what they will accept as a request.
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01
Scope the request
You tell us the property and what you need. We tell you what exists, which office holds it, what it will cost, and how long that office takes. If a document does not exist, you hear that before you pay for the search.
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02
Place the request
We file with the records office in the form that office accepts — in person, by portal, or by written request under the applicable public-records statute. More than twenty-five years of doing this means we usually know the clerk.
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03
Verify what comes back
A records office sends what it has, which is not always what was asked for. We check the return against the request, chase the gaps, and flag anything that arrives incomplete or superseded.
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04
Deliver as a citable set
You get the documents as scanned PDFs with a provenance index: what each document is, which office it came from, the date retrieved, and the request it answered. Clerk fees are itemized at cost.
What we pull
If it is in the zoning record for a property, it is in scope. These are the requests we run most often.
Not listed is not out of scope — ask. Anything held by a planning, zoning, building, or clerk's office in a jurisdiction we cover is a request we can place.
Questions commonly asked
Direct answers, the ones we get on calls.
- You hear that during scoping, before you pay for a search. Older parcels routinely have gaps — a plat that was never recorded, a CO issued before the office kept them. We report the gap and where we looked, which is itself a finding your file may need.
- Itemized at cost and never marked up. If you order a report instead, the first $200 of document cost is included in the report price — one of the few places in this industry where retrieval is not a pass-through line item.
- It depends entirely on the records office, which is why this service is quoted on scope rather than sold with a fixed SLA. Some portals return same-day; some counties are four weeks. We tell you which you are dealing with before you order.
- If you need a determination, yes — the report includes the retrieval and the analysis, and the first $200 of documents is covered. Retrieval on its own is for when you have your own analyst and you just need the record.
Often ordered with retrieval
Start your zoning due diligence
Request a same day quote with clear pricing and turnaround. Most reports are completed within five to ten business days once required documents are received.