---
title: "Title Examiner, Abstractor, and Searcher"
description: "Search real estate records, examine titles, or summarize pertinent legal or insurance documents or details for a variety of purposes. May compile lists…"
canonical: "https://nuecareer.com/careers/title-examiner-abstractor-and-searcher"
last-updated: "2026-10-09T10:57:55.138Z"
---

# Title Examiner, Abstractor, and Searcher

**Category:** Legal · **SOC code:** 23-2093 · **O\*NET-SOC code:** 23-2093.00

Search real estate records, examine titles, or summarize pertinent legal or insurance documents or details for a variety of purposes. May compile lists of mortgages, contracts, and other instruments pertaining to titles by searching public and private records for law firms, real estate agencies, or title insurance companies.

Also advertised as: Abstractor; Advisory Title Officer; Commercial Examiner; Commercial Title Examiner; Examiner; Title Abstractor; Title Agent; Title Examiner.

## At a glance

- **Median annual wage:** $58,650 (BLS OEWS, May 2025)
- **Median hourly wage:** $28.20/hr
- **Wage range (10th–90th percentile):** $38,170 to $90,830, with the middle half between $47,420 and $74,810
- **Total US employment:** 48,580
- **Typical entry education:** High school
- **Preparation required:** Little or no preparation — O\*NET rates this "Job Zone 1-2: Very Little to Some Preparation Needed"
- **Projected growth:** +2.1% over 2025–2035 (BLS EP, 2025–2035)
- **Annual job openings:** 5,300 openings a year
- **AI-resilience score:** 9/100 — a NueCareer heuristic over O\*NET work activities and context, not a BLS or O\*NET figure

## Pay

National wage distribution, BLS OEWS, May 2025, across 48,580 US jobs.

| Percentile | Annual wage |
| --- | --- |
| 10th | $38,170 |
| 25th | $47,420 |
| 50th (median) | $58,650 |
| 75th | $74,810 |
| 90th | $90,830 |
| Mean (average) | $62,350 |

### Pay by state

The 15 highest-paying states, by median annual wage. The cost-of-living-adjusted column divides the state median by that state's BEA Regional Price Parity, so the columns answer different questions: the first is what the job pays there, the second is what that pay buys there.

| State | Median annual wage | Cost-of-living adjusted | Employment |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| CO | $77,600 | $75,302 | 1,400 |
| WV | $77,230 | $86,293 | 350 |
| OR | $76,930 | $74,428 | 640 |
| AK | $75,960 | $74,209 | 100 |
| NV | $71,050 | $71,065 | 620 |
| MA | $69,100 | $65,338 | Not published by BLS |
| CA | $67,230 | $60,721 | Not published by BLS |
| WA | $66,440 | $62,086 | 930 |
| DE | $65,270 | $65,396 | 140 |
| RI | $63,300 | $61,889 | 120 |
| CT | $62,940 | $60,747 | 90 |
| UT | $62,210 | $62,925 | 1,160 |
| NH | $62,090 | $59,607 | Not published by BLS |
| NJ | $61,930 | $56,918 | 550 |
| ID | $61,730 | $64,643 | 640 |

33 more states with published wage data are omitted here. The full table for all 48 states is at https://nuecareer.com/careers/title-examiner-abstractor-and-searcher/salary-by-state, or as JSON at https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/title-examiner-abstractor-and-searcher.

## Outlook

BLS projects employment to move from 59,800 in the 2025–2035 base year to 61,100 by the end of the cycle — a gain of 1,300 jobs, or +2.1%. Slower than average: 2.1% against 3.5% projected for all occupations over the same cycle. About 5,300 openings a year are expected on average, counting openings from growth as well as from workers leaving the occupation permanently. Source: BLS EP, 2025–2035.

## How to get in

- **Typical entry education:** High school diploma or equivalent (BLS Employment Projections).
- **Preparation level:** Little or no preparation — O\*NET's preparation band for this occupation is "Job Zone 1-2: Very Little to Some Preparation Needed".
- **Related work experience typically required:** None.
- **Typical on-the-job training:** Moderate-term on-the-job training.

### Education people in this job actually hold

O\*NET surveys incumbents, so this distribution describes who is in the job today and can differ from the BLS entry requirement above.

| Education level | Share of workers |
| --- | --- |
| High School Diploma or the equivalent (such as a GED) | 54.5% |
| Bachelor's Degree | 13.6% |
| Some College Courses | 13.4% |
| Post-Secondary Certificate | 10.2% |
| First Professional Degree | 4.0% |
| Less than a High School Diploma | 3.5% |

## What the work involves

- Examine documentation such as mortgages, liens, judgments, easements, plat books, maps, contracts, and agreements to verify factors such as properties' legal descriptions, ownership, or restrictions.
- Copy or summarize recorded documents, such as mortgages, trust deeds, and contracts, that affect property titles.
- Read search requests to ascertain types of title evidence required and to obtain descriptions of properties and names of involved parties.
- Obtain maps or drawings delineating properties from company title plants, county surveyors, or assessors' offices.
- Enter into record-keeping systems appropriate data needed to create new title records or to update existing ones.
- Prepare lists of all legal instruments applying to a specific piece of land and the buildings on it.
- Examine individual titles to determine if restrictions, such as delinquent taxes, will affect titles and limit property use.
- Confer with realtors, lending institution personnel, buyers, sellers, contractors, surveyors, and courthouse personnel to exchange title-related information or to resolve problems.

## Skills and knowledge

### Essential skills

- Reading Comprehension — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Listening — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speaking — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Critical Thinking — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Writing — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Monitoring — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Learning — importance 2.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Learning Strategies — importance 2.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Transferable skills

These are the skills that carry into other occupations, and they drive the related-occupation and career-change rankings on this site.

- Time Management — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Complex Problem Solving — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Coordination — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Judgment and Decision Making — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Service Orientation — importance 2.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Social Perceptiveness — importance 2.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Persuasion — importance 2.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Instructing — importance 2.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Knowledge areas

- Customer and Personal Service — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Administrative — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- English Language — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Computers and Electronics — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Administration and Management — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Production and Processing — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Abilities

- Oral Comprehension — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Comprehension — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Oral Expression — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Near Vision — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Expression — importance 3.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Deductive Reasoning — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

## Who it suits

O\*NET rates every occupation on the six Holland (RIASEC) interest areas, on a 1–7 scale. This occupation's strongest areas are Conventional (C), Enterprising (E).

| Interest area | Score (1–7) |
| --- | --- |
| C — Conventional | 6.74 |
| E — Enterprising | 3.44 |
| I — Investigative | 2.63 |
| R — Realistic | 2.44 |
| S — Social | 2.34 |
| A — Artistic | 1.11 |

### Personality fit

These scores are **derived by NueCareer**, not published by any government agency: they are cosine similarities between a personality type's trait profile and this occupation's O\*NET interest and work-style ratings, expressed 0–100. Treat them as a starting point for exploration, not as evidence that a type belongs in a job.

| Type | Fit score (0–100) |
| --- | --- |
| ESTJ | 83.9 |
| ISTJ | 82.1 |
| ISFJ | 79.0 |
| ESFJ | 73.7 |
| ENTJ | 58.6 |

Best-fitting types: ESTJ, ISTJ, ISFJ.

## Related occupations

O\*NET's primary related occupations, in its own ranked order.

- [File Clerk](https://nuecareer.com/careers/file-clerk) — median $43,600
- [Paralegal](https://nuecareer.com/careers/paralegal) — median $62,890
- [Appraiser and Assessor of Real Estate](https://nuecareer.com/careers/appraiser-and-assessor-of-real-estate) — median $67,960
- [Court, Municipal, and License Clerk](https://nuecareer.com/careers/court-municipal-and-license-clerk) — median $48,700
- [Insurance Claim and Policy Processing Clerk](https://nuecareer.com/careers/insurance-claim-and-policy-processing-clerk) — median $49,230
- [Appraiser of Personal and Business Property](https://nuecareer.com/careers/appraiser-of-personal-and-business-property) — median $67,960
- [Court Reporter and Simultaneous Captioner](https://nuecareer.com/careers/court-reporter-and-simultaneous-captioner) — median $72,420
- [Legal Secretary and Administrative Assistant](https://nuecareer.com/careers/legal-secretary-and-administrative-assistant) — median $55,570
- [Credit Authorizer, Checker, and Clerk](https://nuecareer.com/careers/credit-authorizer-checker-and-clerk) — median $50,080
- [Government Property Inspector and Investigator](https://nuecareer.com/careers/government-property-inspector-and-investigator) — median $80,730

## Sources

- **O\*NET** — O\*NET 31.0 Database, August 2026. https://www.onetcenter.org/database.html
- **BLS OEWS** — BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025. https://www.bls.gov/oes/
- **BLS EP** — BLS Employment Projections, Table 1.2, 2025–2035. https://www.bls.gov/emp/
- **BEA RPP** — BEA Regional Price Parities by State, 2024. https://www.bea.gov/data/prices-inflation/regional-price-parities-state-and-metro-area

---

This bank includes information from the O\*NET 31.0 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). O\*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. NueCareer has transformed the data by joining it to BLS wage and projection data and deriving facet, personality-fit and AI-resilience scores. BLS and BEA data are public domain (17 U.S.C. §105).

O\*NET content is used under [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). How these figures are sourced and derived: https://nuecareer.com/careers/methodology

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