If you’re buying a US$2 million apartment in Lima from Miami, Madrid or Mexico City, here’s the document that decides whether you actually close: the SUNARP property record. Peru has no title insurance the way the United States does — no Stewart Title or Old Republic underwriting your deal. Instead, the chain of ownership, every lien and every cautionary measure lives in one electronic file at SUNARP, the Peruvian land registry. Knowing how to read the SUNARP property record separates the deal that closes from the one that collapses a week before the public deed. This guide explains the document’s structure, what to check in each entry, and the eight liens that kill premium transactions in Lima.
What the SUNARP property record is and why it defines a US$2M deal
SUNARP (Superintendencia Nacional de los Registros Públicos) is Peru’s national land registry — think of it as the US county recorder’s office, but unified nationally and fully digital. The SUNARP property record (partida registral) is the electronic file recording every legal event on a property: ownership, mortgages, liens, easements, lawsuits, physical modifications, condominium bylaws. For apartments in Miraflores, San Isidro, Barranco and Surco, the relevant office is usually Zona Registral N° IX – Sede Lima.
The official portal is sunarp.gob.pe and you can pull a record online through the Servicio de Publicidad Registral en Línea (SPRL). A cadastral search costs S/ 6.00 (around US$1.60) and a full literal copy of the record is S/ 10.00 (around US$2.70) per page, per the current SUNARP fee schedule. The literal copy is the document a real estate attorney will read line by line: it shows every entry, every date, and the registrar who signed it.
For US$2M deals, the SUNARP property record is not pulled once. Best practice is to request three full literal copies: at the earnest money agreement, seven days before the public deed, and on signing day. SUNARP updates its national index in under 24 hours, so a lien filed yesterday shows up today. Pulling the record only on day one is flying blind through the rest of escrow.
How it is structured: rubros, entries, and reading by columns
The SUNARP property record is divided into four sections, each identified by a letter. Rubro A holds the ownership history, Rubro B holds liens and encumbrances, Rubro C covers acts related to the property itself, and Rubro D records cautionary measures and special judicial restrictions. Each item within a section is called an asiento (entry) and is numbered chronologically: A0001, A0002, B0001, B0002, and so on.
Rubro A — Ownership history
This is the chain of title: who bought, from whom, on what date, for how much, and under what instrument (purchase, gift, payment in kind, judicial award, intestate succession). For a condo unit, the first entry of Rubro A is the unit’s separation from the parent record (the original land record of the building). For apartments in La Mar or Santa Cruz, Miraflores, it is common to see more than a dozen Rubro A entries if the property has changed hands repeatedly since 1990.
Rubro B — Liens and encumbrances
Rubro B is the heart of due diligence. Active mortgages, easements, life estates, anticresis (a Peruvian-specific lien you’ll meet below) and other encumbrances all live here. If the apartment has a US$700,000 mortgage with BBVA, entry B0005 will show the recording date, the secured amount, the public deed number, and the notary’s name. If the seller says the payoff is “in process,” demand the recorded mortgage release before signing the earnest money agreement. Without recording, the lien stays with the property.
Rubro C — Acts related to the property
Physical modifications, mergers, subdivisions, building declarations (declaratorias de fábrica), expansions, condominium bylaws. For a penthouse on Pezet, San Isidro, this section typically records the unit’s separation, the assignment of air rights (aires), and the bylaws that govern the horizontal property regime under Peruvian Law 27157.
Rubro D — Cautionary measures and special restrictions
Attachments, no-innovation injunctions, recorded lawsuits, bankruptcy notices, divorce proceedings under community property regimes. A lis pendens recorded as entry D0001 may have a five-year court case behind it. Buying with a recorded lawsuit is not illegal in Peru, but the buyer assumes the risk and no serious bank will approve a mortgage on the property.
The 8 liens that kill a premium deal
These are the eight that an attorney flags in red the moment they appear in the SUNARP property record. Each one with the section it lives in and the typical workout.
1. Active mortgage (Rubro B)
The most common encumbrance. It appears as “Hipoteca a favor de [bank] por US$ X.” If the outstanding balance is less than the sale price, the workout is to coordinate the payoff at closing: the buyer wires the bank’s payoff amount and the rest to the seller, usually via cashier’s check. The mortgage release is recorded in the same registry act, all before the same notary on the same day.
2. Judicial attachment (Rubro D)
Filed by court order for tax, labor or civil debts. SUNAT, Peru’s tax authority, can order attachments for debts above 1 UIT (S/ 5,350 in 2025), though premium-deal attachments are usually for far larger sums. The attachment blocks transfer until lifted, which can take 30 to 90 days. On a US$2M deal, that means renegotiating timelines or losing the deal.
3. Anticresis (Rubro B)
A lien with no direct US equivalent: the debtor hands the property to the creditor, who collects rents until the debt is paid. If a recorded anticresis appears, the buyer takes title with the creditor’s right still attached. It is governed by articles 1091 to 1096 of the Peruvian Civil Code. Less common in Lima Top than in mid-market deals, but it does appear.
4. Easement (Rubro B)
Real rights that burden the property: rights of way, of light, of view, of utility lines. For a penthouse on the Malecón Cisneros with Pacific views, a recorded no-build easement on the neighboring lot is an asset. A right-of-way easement in favor of the neighbor, running across your parking spot, is a liability. Read the entry to see which way the easement points before signing.
5. Life estate / usufruct (Rubro B)
The life tenant has the right to use and enjoy the property without owning it. It is common in inheritances where the deceased leaves bare ownership to the children and a life estate to the surviving spouse. If the apartment in San Antonio you want to buy has a recorded life estate, you cannot occupy the unit until the life estate ends (articles 999 to 1025 of the Civil Code). It is a recurring deal-killer in premium succession sales.
6. No-innovation injunction (Rubro D)
Ordered by a judge to preserve the status quo of the property while a case is pending. A recorded no-innovation injunction blocks physical modifications and, in practice, freezes any transfer until the court lifts it. The case behind it can run 18 to 48 months if it reaches the Peruvian Supreme Court. For a buyer with a defined timeline, a recorded injunction is an immediate red flag.
7. Lis pendens / recorded lawsuit (Rubro D)
The plaintiff obtains a court order to record the lawsuit on the disputed property’s record. The transfer can legally close, but the buyer takes the risk: if the plaintiff wins, the transaction can be rescinded or the buyer’s rights limited. No top-tier Peruvian bank (BBVA, BCP, Interbank, Scotiabank, Banbif) will finance a purchase with a recorded lawsuit. In all-cash deals it becomes a buyer-and-attorney call.
8. Child-support charge (Rubro D)
When a family court orders a property to be charged as security for child-support payments, the entry appears in Rubro D. It is common in divorce or separation cases involving minors. The charge does not necessarily block the sale, but it requires that the secured amount be carved out of the price and paid into court or directly to the support beneficiary.
Quick checklist: what your attorney must verify before the public deed
- Full literal copy of the SUNARP record issued less than 7 days before the public-deed signing date.
- Validity of the seller’s powers of attorney if signing through a representative, also verified at SUNARP (Mandates and Powers Registry).
- Seller’s marital status both at the time of acquisition and at the time of sale, to rule out unresolved community-property regimes.
- Match between the area recorded at SUNARP and the actual area of the apartment (architect-led measurement if the gap exceeds 2%).
- Consistency between the unit record and the parent-property record of the building (formally recorded separation).
- Negative cadastral certificate or cadastral search ruling out overlaps with neighboring properties.
How to read a SUNARP property record step by step
The attorney opens the PDF and goes straight to the last page. The final page always carries the issuance date and the registrar’s electronic signature. If the literal copy was issued 30 days ago, it is useless for a deed scheduled for tomorrow. Top Lima notaries work with copies less than 7 days old, 15 days at the absolute outside.
Then each section is reviewed in reverse order: Rubro D first (urgent problems), then Rubro B (mortgages and easements), Rubro C (to confirm the recorded area matches the architectural plan), and Rubro A last to reconstruct the chain of transfers. Every entry is read in three columns: description, recording date, and registrar’s signature. If an entry is crossed out with “cancelado,” confirm the cancellation is itself formally recorded and not a note added later.
For apartments in new buildings, like The Wave by Montecatini or The Grand by Octagon, there is one extra check: the unit’s separation must be recorded before the public deed, not after. If you buy before formal separation, what you receive is a fractional interest in the parent property, not your individualized apartment, and recording in your name will depend on how fast the developer completes the paperwork.
Costs and timing of the SUNARP filing
Per the current SUNARP fee schedule, a literal copy costs S/ 10.00 per page and a cadastral search S/ 6.00. The SPRL portal runs 24/7 and delivers the digital copy in minutes for active records. For records closed and migrated to microform (very old properties), expect up to three business days.
To record a sale, the legal review window is 7 business days from the moment the title enters the registry. If the registrar issues an observation (formal defect), you have 35 business days to cure. A common observation is that the Alcabala (transfer tax) receipt is out of date or that the standardized purchase form has errors. Alcabala is calculated at 3% on the portion above 10 UIT of the appraised value or sale price, whichever is higher; on a US$2M deal (roughly S/ 7.5M at May 2026 exchange rates), the bill typically lands between S/ 215,000 and S/ 230,000 (around US$58,000 to US$62,000).
The Ministry of Housing, Construction and Sanitation (MVCS) regulates licensed real estate agents through the Registro de Agentes Inmobiliarios. SUNAT administers the second-category income tax that taxes capital gains at 5% on the difference between the indexed acquisition cost and the sale price, unless the principal-home exemption applies. Indecopi, Peru’s consumer protection agency, recommends running the developer through the Mira a quién le compras registry before signing.
Common mistakes when reading premium records
The first mistake is assuming that a record with no Rubro D entries means there is no problem. A freshly filed lawsuit may not yet be recorded, which is why you ask SUNARP for a national-index search of cautionary measures. The second is confusing private cancellation with registered cancellation: a mortgage paid off via a bank letter is not a mortgage released at the registry; until the release is recorded, the lien remains active for SUNARP and for any future buyer.
The third is failing to verify the seller’s marital regime. If the seller bought as a married person under community property and now sells without the spouse’s signature, the deal is voidable. The check is done by cross-referencing the property record with the Registry of Natural Persons and, in some cases, the Personal Registry where separations of patrimony are recorded.
The fourth and most expensive is skipping the building’s bylaws recorded in Rubro C. Boutique buildings in Barranco often have clauses limiting short-term rentals, banning large pets, or requiring the owners’ association to approve any interior modification. If you buy a penthouse to rent on premium Airbnb and the bylaws prohibit it, you lost the business model before signing.
Frequently Asked Questions
Closing thought
A SUNARP property record is not something you skim. You read it in reverse, with all four sections in front of you, and you cross-check against the physical reality of the apartment. On US$2M premium deals, ordering three separate literal copies and a cadastral search costs less than US$60; skipping that read can cost a year of work. Learning how to read the SUNARP property record does not turn the buyer into an attorney, but it does tell the buyer exactly what to demand from the legal team before transferring the first dollar.
This content is informational and does not constitute legal or tax advice. Every case must be reviewed by a licensed Peruvian attorney or accountant. Peruvian regulations may have changed since publication; always verify the latest version with SUNAT, SUNARP or the relevant official source.
If you are evaluating a premium purchase in Lima Top from abroad and need a team that coordinates the SUNARP read with your attorney and notary, write to hola@penthouse.pe. You can also read our guide on the Peruvian purchase agreement, the Alcabala transfer tax on high-value property, the SUNARP search for luxury real estate in Lima, the 14 reasons to live in Miraflores, the price per square meter in San Isidro 2026, and the guide to buying a luxury apartment in Lima from abroad.
Penthouse.pe Editorial Team. Specialized coverage of luxury real estate in Lima’s premium districts. Inquiries: hola@penthouse.pe
