Access Adams County Deed Records

Adams County deed records are filed and maintained by the Adams County Clerk and Recorder in Quincy, Illinois, where the office is the official keeper of all property conveyances, mortgages, liens, and land instruments recorded in the county. Anyone who needs to search deed records in Adams County, whether for a property purchase, a title review, or an estate matter, can access the public name index at 507 Vermont St. in Quincy or submit a mail-in request to the office.

Adams County Clerk and Recorder

The Adams County Clerk and Recorder is at 507 Vermont St., Quincy, IL 62301. Phone is (217) 277-2150. The office runs Monday through Friday. Adams County combines Clerk and Recorder functions in one building, so the same office handles both county administrative records and the official deed and land records archive.

Every deed filed at the Quincy office gets stamped with a recording date and assigned a unique document number. Staff enter the grantor's name and the grantee's name into the public index that same day. From that point on, the instrument is findable by any member of the public who searches by either party name. That index is the core tool for tracing property ownership in Adams County and is open at no charge during business hours at 507 Vermont St.

The office takes in a wide range of land-related instruments. Warranty deeds and quitclaim deeds make up the bulk of filings, but mortgages, mortgage releases, mechanic's liens, judgment liens, easements, plat maps, and UCC filings tied to real property all go through the same Quincy office. Each gets verified, stamped, indexed, and stored. Staff can point you to the right index section but will not search on your behalf.

The Illinois Department of Revenue PTAX-203 instructions page, shown below from tax.illinois.gov, explains the transfer declaration form that must accompany most taxable deed recordings in Adams County.

The PTAX-203 instructions walk through which sales trigger the transfer tax, how to compute the amount owed, and which exemptions allow a transfer to proceed without paying the tax in Adams County.

Deed Recording Requirements in Adams County

A deed submitted for recording in Quincy must comply with the Illinois Conveyances Act at 765 ILCS 5. The law requires three things: the grantor and grantee must be named, a legal description of the property must be included, and a notarized acknowledgment must appear on the document. Any deed that fails on any of those points will be handed back at the Quincy counter without being recorded.

Adams County deeds also need the parcel identification number for the land being conveyed. The PIN is usually placed near the legal description or at the top of the first page. A clear 3-inch by 5-inch space must be left in the upper right corner of the first page so the Recorder's staff can apply the recording stamp and indexing data. Cover that space or skip the PIN, and the document will be returned for correction.

Most taxable property sales in Adams County require the PTAX-203 Real Estate Transfer Declaration to travel with the deed at recording time. The form is completed online through the state's MyDec system at mytax.illinois.gov before you arrive at 507 Vermont St. Certain transfers are exempt from the PTAX-203 requirement, such as family gifts, court-ordered conveyances, and some transfers into revocable trusts. Even exempt transfers must note the exemption on the form and have it accepted at the Recorder's counter in Quincy.

Adams County land descriptions commonly use the Public Land Survey System, referencing townships, ranges, and sections. Confirm that the legal description in your deed matches what the county assessor has on file before you bring the document to the Quincy office. Errors in legal descriptions can cloud title and are expensive to correct after recording.

Transfer Tax and Recording Fees in Adams County

Illinois charges a real estate transfer tax on most deed conveyances under 35 ILCS 200. The state rate is $0.50 per $500 of sale price. Adams County adds $0.25 per $500 on top. On a $120,000 sale in Quincy or elsewhere in Adams County, the state takes $120 and the county adds $60, for a combined total of $180 before any local Quincy city transfer tax that may also apply. Revenue stamps go on the deed at recording.

Per-page recording fees follow the schedule under 55 ILCS 5/3-5018, which caps what county recorders in Illinois can charge. Call (217) 277-2150 or visit 507 Vermont St. to get the current Adams County recording fee schedule before submitting any documents for recording.

Every document recorded in Illinois carries a mandatory $18 RHSP surcharge per instrument. The Rental Housing Support Program fee is not tied to the sale price and is not reduced by the length of the document. It is a flat amount collected at the counter in Quincy when you hand over the deed, on top of the per-page recording fee and any transfer tax owed.

Veterans who want to record DD-214 military discharge papers can do so at no charge at the Adams County Clerk and Recorder. Certified copies of DD-214 records are available to eligible veterans and surviving family members. Call (217) 277-2150 to confirm the current policy before coming to the Quincy office.

Searching Adams County Property Records

The public grantor and grantee name index at 507 Vermont St. in Quincy is open for walk-in searches during regular business hours. The index covers all instruments ever recorded at the Adams County office and is searchable by party name. Have the current or prior owner's full legal name ready, along with the property address or parcel ID if you have it. Staff will direct you to the right section of the index, but the actual searching is your work to do.

Once you locate a specific instrument in the index, you can request a copy. Copies are priced per page under the 55 ILCS 5/3-5018 schedule. Certified copies carry a slightly higher fee. For a full title search that goes back 40 or more years, plan to work through both the grantor index and the grantee index to build each link in the ownership chain.

Mail-in requests go to 507 Vermont St., Quincy, IL 62301. Include the names of the parties, the approximate recording year or date range, any document numbers you already have, and a check or money order for the expected copy fee. The office will search and mail results back. In-person visits are faster for most requests and give you a chance to review the index directly in Quincy.

Illinois operates under a race-notice recording system. The first buyer to record who was unaware of any prior unrecorded transfer generally holds the stronger ownership claim. Filing your deed at the Quincy office promptly after closing protects your title against any later competing claims for the same Adams County property.

eRecording Adams County Deeds

The Illinois Electronic Recording Act at 765 ILCS 33 allows county recorders to receive documents submitted digitally through approved vendor platforms. When eRecording is active in Adams County, title companies and lenders can submit deed files through systems like Simplifile, CSC, EPN, Hopdox, or Indecomm, get them processed by the Quincy office, and receive stamped copies back electronically without a trip to 507 Vermont St.

Call (217) 277-2150 to confirm whether eRecording is currently available at the Adams County Clerk and Recorder and which vendor systems are accepted. Individual sellers and buyers who are not set up with an eRecording vendor bring their signed, notarized deed and MyDec barcode confirmation to the Quincy counter in person. That path works fine for one-time transactions and requires no advance account setup.

The Adams County Deed Archive

The Clerk and Recorder's office in Quincy holds many decades of Adams County property history. The permanent archive includes warranty deeds, quitclaim deeds, trustee's deeds, sheriff's deeds from foreclosure and tax sales, land contract memoranda, mortgages and mortgage releases, mechanic's liens and releases, judgment liens, easements, right-of-way documents, subdivision plat maps, survey records, UCC filings tied to real property, and DD-214 military discharge records. Every instrument gets a document number and appears in the name index under both the grantor's and grantee's names.

The 35 ILCS 200 property tax code connects to the deed recording process in a practical way. Sale price data from the PTAX-203 forms filed with Adams County deeds goes to the county assessor, which uses it to calibrate property valuations for tax purposes. When you review older recorded deeds in Quincy, the transfer tax stamps on the document give a window into what the property sold for at each prior transfer.

Tracing a chain of title for an Adams County parcel means working through the grantor and grantee indexes from the current owner backward through all prior conveyances. Public access to the index at 507 Vermont St. is free during business hours. For rural Adams County properties, that chain can stretch back many generations in the Quincy office's records.

Nearby Counties

Land near an Adams County border may have deed records held by a neighboring county's recorder. Each of these counties keeps its own separate deed archive.