Caveats in Queensland: protecting an interest in land before settlement

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Kooky

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Queensland's land register records who owns each lot and what is registered against it. It does not record everything. A buyer who has signed a contract but not yet settled has rights in the land that appear nowhere on the title. So does a person who paid toward a property that sits in someone else's name, or a lender whose security was never registered. If the registered owner sells or mortgages the land in the meantime, those unrecorded rights can be overtaken.

A caveat is the register's answer. It is a notice, lodged by the person claiming the interest, that stops the registry from recording dealings that would cut across the claim. It is quick to lodge, powerful while it lasts and deliberately temporary, and the legislation attaches a real price to using it without good reason. This guide explains how caveats work under the Land Title Act 1994, drawing on Titles Queensland's Land Title Practice Manual: who may lodge one, what it must say, what it blocks, how long it lasts and how it comes off. It describes the general rules and is no substitute for advice on a particular claim.

Land Title Act 1994, sections 126 and 129, as set out in Titles Queensland's Land Title Practice Manual, Part 11, updated 1 August 2025.

What a caveat is

The Land Title Practice Manual describes a caveat as a notice to the Registrar which prohibits the registration of an instrument or document affecting the interest the caveator claims, until the caveat is withdrawn, removed, lapses or is cancelled. The person who lodges it is the caveator. The person whose interest it affects, usually the registered owner, is the caveatee.

Titles Queensland's public guidance puts the purpose in practical terms: a caveat preserves the status quo of a title when parties are in dispute, allowing time for the dispute to be resolved between them or through the courts. It adds that the relevant provisions are sections 121 to 131 of the Land Title Act 1994.

Two things follow from that description. A caveat does not decide anything. It does not prove the caveator's claim, transfer any interest or give the caveator a right to possession. It holds the register still. And it is not meant to last. The registry's guidance says that in most cases the duration of a caveat ranges from 14 days to three months, unless steps taken by the caveator extend its effect until a court determines the dispute.

Why a buyer has something to protect

Between contract and settlement the seller remains the registered owner. The buyer has paid a deposit and is bound to pay the rest, and the law recognises that the buyer already has an interest in the land.

The Practice Manual lists the interests that will support a caveat, and the first on its list is that of a purchaser under a valid unconditional contract of sale. The others it names are a chargee under an agreement that specifically charges the land, an unregistered or equitable mortgagee, a beneficiary of a constructive, resulting or implied trust, and a trustee in bankruptcy after the property has vested.

Law firm Attwood Marshall, in an article of 28 July 2026 on lodging caveats, gives similar examples in plainer terms: purchasers under land contracts, who hold an equitable interest pending completion, and people who have contributed to the cost of acquiring or maintaining a property without being on the title.

The manual's list of what will not support a caveat is as instructive as the list of what will. A judgment debt does not. Nor does a personal contractual right, a mere possibility of succeeding in court, a right of first refusal, or the interest of a beneficiary under a discretionary trust. Being owed money by the owner of a house is not, without more, an interest in the house.

Why most buyers never lodge one

If every buyer has a caveatable interest once the contract is unconditional, it might seem that every buyer should lodge a caveat. In practice very few do in an ordinary sale. The settlement period is short, the seller has every reason to complete, and the conveyancing system has other safeguards. The Practice Manual observes that the need for a caveat to protect a purchaser under a contract of sale has generally been superseded by priority notices, which it deals with in a separate part.

A caveat becomes relevant when something has gone wrong: the seller says the contract is at an end and the buyer says it is not, or there are signs that the land is about to be sold or mortgaged to someone else. In that situation a buyer who wants the sale enforced has to keep the title where it is while the argument is resolved, and the caveat is how that is done.

One group of buyers has a caveat right written into the legislation. The manual notes that a purchaser under an instalment contract may lodge a caveat under section 93 of the Property Law Act 2023, and that such a caveat is not subject to the lapsing rules described below.

Buyers are only one kind of caveator. Section 122 of the Land Title Act sets out who may lodge a caveat, and the manual lists them. A person claiming an interest in a lot is the main category. The others are more specialised: the Registrar; the registered owner of the lot; a person to whom a court has ordered that an interest be transferred; a person with the benefit of a court order restraining the owner from dealing with the lot; a purchaser under an instalment contract; an equitable mortgagee; a person objecting to an application based on adverse possession; and the holder of an interest under a notice given under water legislation.

An owner's caveat over their own land may seem odd. It is a precaution, used by an owner who wants nothing registered against the land without warning, and the manual records that a caveat lodged by the registered owner does not lapse.

What the form must say

A caveat is lodged on the registry's Form 11. Section 121 prescribes the content, which the manual sets out: the caveator's full name; an address for service, which may be a legal practitioner's address; the name and address of the registered owner and of anyone else affected; the registered interest affected; a description of the part of the lot concerned, if the caveat relates to only part; the interest the caveator claims; and the grounds on which it is claimed. The caveat must be signed by or on behalf of the caveator.

The last two items are where caveats succeed or fail. The form asks what interest is claimed and why, and the answers have to describe an interest of the kind the law recognises. A caveat that claims "an equitable interest" without saying how it arose invites a challenge. The manual also notes that a caveat is among the instruments that must be lodged electronically where the electronic conveyancing mandate applies, so it is ordinarily prepared and lodged by a solicitor.

When a caveat is lodged the Registrar must give written notice of it, under section 123, to each registered proprietor affected and to others whose interests or rights to registration are affected. A caveat is never a secret from the owner.

What it stops, and what it does not

Section 124 states the effect. A lodged caveat prevents the registration of an instrument or document affecting the lot until the caveat is withdrawn, removed, cancelled or rejected, or lapses.

The manual lists exceptions, and they are worth knowing because they show a caveat is not a complete freeze. An instrument can still be registered if the caveat itself says it does not apply to it, or if the caveator consents in writing. Dealings that do not touch the interest claimed, such as a release of mortgage or a change of the owner's name, are not blocked. A writ of execution can be registered whether it was lodged before or after the caveat. And a mortgagee whose mortgage was registered before the caveat can still exercise its powers: an instrument executed by that mortgagee, including a transfer on a mortgagee's sale, is not stopped.

That last exception matters to anyone who caveats a property that is heavily mortgaged. The caveat ranks behind the earlier registered mortgage. It protects the caveator against the owner's later dealings. It does not protect against a bank that was there first.

Three months, or fourteen days

The lapsing rules in section 126 are what make a caveat temporary, and they catch out more caveators than any other part of the scheme.

The basic rule, in the manual's summary, is that a caveat lapses unless the caveator does two things within three months of lodging it: starts a proceeding in a court of competent jurisdiction to establish the interest claimed, and deposits a notice of that action with the Registrar. The notice is a Form 14 general request identifying the caveat and the court action number, with a copy of the originating proceeding. There is no fee for it.

The owner can shorten the period. A caveatee may serve a notice on the caveator requiring proceedings to be started. The caveator then has 14 days to start the proceeding and deposit the notice of action, or the caveat lapses. The caveatee, for their part, must notify the Registrar within 14 days of serving the notice.

Both steps are required. Starting proceedings is not enough if the Registrar is never told. The proceeding also has to be one that seeks to establish the interest claimed in the caveat, not some other dispute between the same people.

Some caveats sit outside these rules. The manual lists as exempt from lapsing a caveat lodged by the registered owner, one lodged with the registered owner's written consent, one lodged under a court order, one lodged by the Registrar and an instalment contract caveat. It notes one exception to the exceptions: a caveat by an equitable mortgagee always lapses, even if the owner consented.

How a caveat comes off

There are three ways a caveat ends apart from lapse, and each belongs to a different person.

The caveator may withdraw it under section 125, by a Form 14 request to withdraw signed by the caveator or their solicitor. Lodgement fees apply. This is the ordinary ending when a dispute settles or a delayed sale completes.

The caveatee may apply to the Supreme Court under section 127 for an order that the caveat be removed. The manual notes the application may be made at any time and that the court may make the order whether or not the caveator has been served, on the terms it considers appropriate. The owner then lodges the order with a request to remove the caveat.

The Registrar may cancel a caveat under section 128 if satisfied that the interest claimed has ceased or the claim has been abandoned or withdrawn, that the claim has been settled or otherwise satisfied, or that the nature of the interest does not entitle the caveator to prevent registration of the particular document lodged. The Registrar must first notify the caveator of the intention to cancel and allow seven days for a response. The Registrar may also cancel a caveat immediately before registering an instrument that gives full effect to the interest claimed, which is what happens when a buyer's caveat is followed by the transfer to that buyer.

One chance on the same grounds

A caveator who lets a caveat lapse cannot simply lodge another. Section 129, as the manual explains, prevents the same caveator from lodging a further caveat on the same or substantially the same grounds unless a court of competent jurisdiction gives leave, and a copy of the court's leave must be deposited with the further caveat. Attwood Marshall's article makes the same point: lodging again on similar grounds requires the court's permission.

The rule turns the three-month and 14-day periods into real deadlines. A caveator who misses one has lost the protection, and getting it back means persuading a judge. In the meantime the title is open, and a dealing lodged in the gap can be registered.

The price of a caveat without cause

Because a caveat can be lodged without anyone first testing the claim, the Act deters misuse through liability. Under section 130, in the manual's summary, a person who lodges or continues a caveat without reasonable cause must compensate anyone who suffers loss or damage as a result. The caveat is presumed to have been lodged or continued without reasonable cause unless the caveator proves otherwise, and a court assessing compensation may include a component for exemplary damages.

The reversed burden is the striking feature. In most claims the person seeking compensation has to prove the wrong. Here the caveator has to prove the justification. Attwood Marshall's article gives a failed sale as the kind of loss an owner might suffer and warns that lodging without reasonable cause exposes the caveator to damages and legal costs.

A caveat lodged as leverage in a dispute about something else is the typical case the provision is aimed at: one lodged, say, by a person who is owed money but has no claim to the land. The loss it causes can be large if it stops a settlement, and the person who lodged it carries the burden of justifying it.

Caveats from the seller's side

For a seller, a caveat is something to find early. The standard contract published by the Real Estate Institute of Queensland and the Queensland Law Society provides in clause 7.2 that the property is sold free of all encumbrances other than the title encumbrances and tenancies, and its definition of title encumbrances expressly leaves out any mortgage, caveat or charge. Clause 5.5 requires the seller to deliver at settlement any instrument necessary to release any encumbrance over the property.

A caveat on the seller's title is therefore the seller's to clear before settlement. Since 1 August 2025 a seller has had to obtain a title search to give to the buyer with the disclosure statement before the contract is signed, so a caveat should come to light at that stage. The seller can then ask the caveator to withdraw, serve the notice that starts the 14-day period, or apply to the court. Each takes time, and time is the one thing a seller with a settlement date does not have.

Before lodging

A caveat is rarely something a person lodges alone. The interest has to be one the law recognises, the form has to state it accurately, and a clock starts on the day of lodgement. The practical questions before lodging are the ones the Act will ask afterwards. What exactly is the interest in the land, and what documents show it? Is there a readiness to start court proceedings within three months, or within 14 days if the owner calls for it? And if the claim turns out to be wrong, what loss could the caveat cause in the meantime?

A caveat buys time. The Act decides how much, and charges for time that was not justified.

Used for its purpose, a caveat is one of the most effective protections the land title system offers a person whose interest is not on the register. It keeps the title still for long enough to have a claim heard. It expires if the claim is not pursued, and it carries liability if there was no reasonable basis for it.

Kooky, from Shaka

Kooky edits Queensland Estate and builds Shaka, the payment router he made for Queensland property professionals. One payment comes in, and every agent, agency and party in the deal receives their signed share on closing date.

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