Unlocking sasines

Unlocking sasines will indicate the likely ownership of areas not on the land register with a high degree of certainty.

In many cases, land or property must change hands before RoS can move it from the sasines register to the land register. Lots of land and property that is still in sasines does not change hands very often. For example, large rural estates.

We want to use spatial data to help “unlock” the historic information in the sasine register. This will make it visually more helpful and accessible. It will also help fill in any information gaps.

This will help us answer the question ‘Who owns Scotland?’ and provide many useful insights in working towards land register completion and functional completion of the land register.

What it is

Unlocking sasines is a:

• way of showing indicative ownership and boundaries of sasines titles
• visual representation of sasines registered titles
• way of providing information to help in answering ‘who owns Scotland?’
• first step to establishing ownership which is not yet shown on the land register
• work in progress – indicative ownership boundaries will continue to be added over time

What it isn't

Unlocking sasines is not a:

• property register
• means to confirm ownership and boundaries
• comprehensive display of all sasines titles.

Should you wish to confirm a sasines title a search may be required.

Get in touch

If you would like further information please contact the team at: unlockingsasines@ros.gov.uk

Accessing the dataset

Our Unlocking Sasines dataset is now available as a first phase pilot.

Find out more about the pilot and our plans to make the data more accessible for professionals and members of the public.

Read the blog post on how Unlocking Sasines helps land register completion.

Find out more about how we collaborated using data from the Rural Payments and Inspections Division at Scottish Government.

Read the blog on achieving efficiencies through data collaboration .