Unfortunately, there are many ways to spell a name, and sometimes nicknames may make this a little more difficult. If you aren’t getting the results you desire try alternate spellings or just use the first few letters of a name. Actually, the less specific you are with the Owner Name field, the greater your chances are of getting a result. If you get too many results, then start getting more specific with the Owner Name field to narrow the search.

LASTNAME space FIRSTNAME (no comma)

NOTE: Sometimes there are a few people with the same first and last name. You can try to add a middle initial or middle name after the first name, but be aware that you might not get all the properties for that person since not all entries are the same for the same person. Some manual searching may be required in a few cases.

This is definitely one of the most popular search parameters and requires the most explanation. While it seems to be a pretty self-explanatory feature there are additional functions that it can provide that may not be obvious, and sometimes it may behave unexpectedly. I will try to explain some of the functions and strange behavior below. Please email me with any questions.

ADDRESS NUMBERS

If you know the exact address number you are searching for just enter it in the Address Number field and continue entering values into the rest of the search form. Do not use wildcards on this field or any fields on this site. If you want to find addresses beginning with 8, for example, just type 8 in the Address Number field. This will give you 8, 80-89, 800-899, and 8000-8999. If you type 80, you will get addresses 80, 800-809, and 8000-8099. If you type 800, you will get addresses 800 and 8000 – 8009. If you type 8000, you will get address 8000.

Some properties do not have address numbers, especially cropland. Leave this field blank if you are searching for cropland on a particular road. However, by leaving it blank you will also get all the addresses on that road. You can sort the output by Address and all the parcels without address numbers will be listed first. See the Sort section below for additional information on how to use the sort feature.

ADDRESS NAMES

The Address Name drop down list looks simple enough, and it is, but here are some tips that will help you navigate throught the list more quickly.

At the top of the list are the State Line, County Line, and Highway roads. Below those are all the streets and roads in the county listed alphabetically.

TIP: Press the first letter (or number) of the road/street name you are looking for repeatedly until you see that name. You can also use the mouse or arrow keys to scroll through the list. Unfortunately the list does not select as you type, it only looks at the first letter and goes to that letter or scrolls if you are type the same letter repeatedly. This is still an efficient way of finding an address and eliminates spelling errors. If the end of the list of names starting with a particular letter is reached the scrolling continues from the first name beginning with that letter.

SOME INCORRECT RESULTS: Please be aware that there are a few instances where you may get multiple roads from a selection. This is being worked on. An example is Kremer Road and Kremer-Hoying Road. If you select Kremer, you will not only get the addresses on Kremer Road, but also those on Kremer-Hoying Road since the search is looking for the word Kremer. I am working on a solution for this, but if you sort by address everything should be grouped together.

The Map Number is coded to determine the location of a parcel within 1/2 mile in rural areas and within 1/4 mile in densely populated areas. Here is how it works using 05-25-300-004. The first two digits (05 in this example) indicate the Area (Survey Township [6 miles x 6 miles] – this is NOT the same as the politcal township although they can be). See the Map Area Guide for more information on the Areas. The second two digits (25) indicate the Section (each full Survey Township is divided into 36 1 mile x 1 mile sections). The next three digits indicate the Block (each section is divided into four major Blocks). A Block is 1/4 mile x 1/4 mile and they are labeled as 100 = NorthWest Quarter Section, 200 = NorthEast Quarter Section, 300 = SouthWest Quarter Section, and 400 = SouthWest Quarter Section. In more densely populated areas, the Blocks are broken down futher. 100-125 is the NorthWest Quarter of the NorthWest Quarter Section, 126-150 is the NorthEast Quarter of the NorthWest Quarter Section, 151-175 is the SouthWest Quarter of the NorthWest Quarter Section, and 176-199 is the SouthEast Quarter of the NorthWest Quarter Section. The last three digits indicate the Parcel. 05-25-300-004 tells us that the parcel is located in Area 05, Section 25, Block 300, and Parcel 004. Using the Tax Maps this parcel can be found very quickly.

ENTERING A MAP NUMBER: Do not use the dashes when entering a Map Number. For example, 05-25-300-004 should be entered as 0525300004.

SPECIAL FEATURES: If you want to find all the parcels in Section 25 of Area 05 just enter 0525 in the Map Number field. If you want to find all the parcels in Area 05 just enter 05 in the Map Number field. You can enter as much or as little of the Map Number as you want to tailor your search.

ENTERING A TAX NUMBER: Do not use the dash or dot when entering a Tax Number. For example, 05-024370.0100 should be entered as 050243700100.

SPECIAL FEATURES: The first two digits of a Tax Number are the Taxing District. You can enter as much or as little of the Tax Number as you want to tailor your search. If you just enter the first four digits you will get results for all the properties that have a Tax Number beginning with those four digits.

ENTERING A LEGAL DESCRIPTION: You can enter a partial subdivision name (ie. Eagle) and it will bring up all subdivisions containing Eagle. You can also enter a lot number (ie. 129). The results will display all parcels that have 129 in the legal description. You can enter anything that appears in the Legal Description. However, sometimes searches are more fruitful with less information entered here.

There are several selections here to help narrow your search. Notice that the default is ALL. This will find all properties in the county. Additionally, there is a RURAL selection which finds all properties that are outside of corporation limits. Next in the list you will find all the incorporated areas, then the school districts, and finally the townships.

Just pick the range of values you want to search with.

The Sale Date Range has a couple features that might be confusing unless explained. If either of the Year fields contain ALL, then ALL dates are searched no matter what any of the other sale date range fields contain. If either of the Year fields contain NO DATE, then ALL properties that have NOT been sold since 1983 will be searched no matter what any of the other sale date range fields contain.

All sales from 1983 through the current date may be searched. Even if a property has sold multiple times since 1983 only the latest sale date is shown. There is no sales record online for parcels sold prior to 1983, but the parcel records are online with a date of 00/00/00. Use the NO DATE selection to find these.

There aren’t any special considerations for using the acreage range. It defaults to all (0 – 1000 acres), but allows you to specify various ranges.

Select the Year Built from the drop down list.

Select the range of square feet you want to search for.

While you can select properties using the broad class groups at the top of the list, some of the more popular classes are also listed so the search can be more specific. For example, the 510 – Single Family Dwelling selection is very popular. Other selections can be added if requested.

The style option allows you to search based on the number of stories of a house. You can choose from four options, ALL Stories, One Story, Two Story, or Three Story

Use this field to select properties that have a basement, don’t have a basement, or it doesn’t matter whether the property has a basement. No special features here. Just No Preference, Yes, and No.

You can select the exact number of bedrooms, the minimum number of bedrooms, or No Preference.

There are eight parameters for this field. Armslength, Armslength-Multiple, Family, Family-Multiple, Sheriff, Sheriff-Multiple, Exempt, and Exempt-Multiple. The Multiples mean that multiple properties were sold to the new owner in the same transaction.

This feature has been greatly improved from the old search page. There are four levels of sorting available. If you require more levels just let me know. I figured four levels is at least a good starting point. You can sort by any of the fields listed on the page.

For example, if you want to see all the properties sold last month in order by price, class, location, and date then just select the sale date range for last month and set the sort fields as FIRST BY: SalePrice, SECOND BY: Class, THIRD BY: Location, and FOURTH BY: Sale Date and then click Search.

AERIAL PHOTOGRAPHY

These pictures are in jpg format and range from 100k to 800k in size. Expect most to be around 500k. If you have a dial-up connection it could be a bit of a wait, but you can save the image to your hard drive and view it offline anytime you want

There are two sets of photos:
Set 1:  March 28, 2001
Set 2:  April 3, 2005

2 WAYS TO OBTAIN AERIALS

1. Just click Aerial in the Select column of your search result page.
2. Go to the Aerial Photography page and select a photo from the image maps.

A few people have called or emailed about printing problems with the aerial photos from their web browsers. The best way around this problem is to save the image to your hard drive and then use another graphics program to edit and print the image. This will also allow you to zoom in and crop the portion of the image you are interested in, or even paste several images together making one large image of a portion of the county.

Surveys are continuing to be added, and will take several months to complete. If you get an error that a survey can’t be found, it just means we haven’t scanned it in yet. Thank you for you patience.

The Mercer County Recorder’s Office has been working with the Mercer County Auditor’s Office since the beginning of 2002 to make the deeds available online.  Currently the “old” deed interface has deeds from May 1973 through February 10, 2006 and the “new” deed interface has deeds from July 1996 through today.

There are 3 ways to obtain deeds from this website.

1. OnCore Online Public Search Engine (Recorder’s Search): The bestway to search is by using the Recorder’s OnCore Online Public Search Engine. See the Recorder Search help screens.

2. Auditor’s Parcel Search: Another way is to use the Auditor’s Parcel Search and enter the information you have. After the results page appears, choose the Deed Info option for the parcel of interest. This will take you to Deed Info page where you may select the appropriate deed link. This will then transfer you to the Recorder’s Search and you can choose the item at the top of the search results (in most cases).

3. Using the GIS: Locate the parcel of interest clicking the bioculars (Search tool). Enter the Owner Name, Address, Map #, Tax #, or Legal Description and select the parcel from the list of results. Click the Info Deeds (round blue icon with large “i” and small “D”). Click the parcel of interest and then click the little orange arrow in the info window. This will take you to Deed Info page where you may select the appropriate deed link. This will then transfer you to the Recorder’s Search and you can choose the item at the top of the search results (in most cases).

Below are various links to the help pages for the Mercer County, Ohio Real Estate Search page. Please refer to these pages to gain a better understanding of how this site works.

Although there are two sections to the search page, both sections interact with one another. By default, if you just click the Search button without inputting any other information, you will get a list of all the parcels in Mercer County, Ohio. It is recommended that you do not do this since it will take a very long time and slow the server down for others. Please input at least one value before clicking the Search button.

Seaching by owner name or address are probably the most common searches. To enter an owner name please enter it as LASTNAME FIRSTNAME. Do not use a comma. To enter an address please enter the road/street name WITHOUT the suffix (i.e. Rd, Pike, St, etc.) , and optionally enter the ADDRESS NUMBER. If you leave the number off, it will show you everything on that road/street.

If you have either a Map Number or Tax Number for a parcel just enter that number into the appropriate field without punctuation. For example, Map Numbers are formatted like 01-01-100-001, but must be entered as 0101100001. Just drop the dashes. Similarly, the Tax Numbers are formatted like 01-001100.0000, but must be entered as 010011000000.

This feature has been greatly improved from the old search page. There are four levels of sorting available. You can sort by any of the fields listed on the page.

The Location drop down list contains ALL, RURAL ONLY, CORPS, TOWNSHIPS, and SCHOOL DISTRICTS. This defaults to ALL so you can find everything in the county, but if, for example, you would like to find a property on Main Street in Celina, but you don’t know the exact address number, just select Main from the Address drop down list, and select Celina Corp from the Location drop down list, and you will get the results for all the properties on Main Street in Celina. This eliminates the need to sort through all the Main Street propeties in other towns.

Sale Price Range, Acreage Range, Year Built Range, Square Footage Range – hopefully these are self-explanatory

The Sale Date Range has a couple features that might be confusing unless explained. If either of the Year fields contain ALL, then ALL dates are searched no matter what any of the other sale date range fields contain. If either of the Year fields contain NO DATE, then ALL properties that have NOT been sold since 1983 will be searched no matter what any of the other sale date range fields contain.

All sales from 1983 through the current date may be searched. Even if a property has sold multiple times since 1983 only the latest sale date is shown. There is no sales record online for parcels sold prior to 1983, but the parcel records are online with a date of 00/00/00. Use the NO DATE selection to find these.

The Class drop down list provides a list of the general property classification breakdowns and has a few of the more popular classes listed separately such as 510 – Single Family Dwelling and 100 – Vacant Agricultural Land.

The Style drop down allows you to choose the number of stories of a dwelling.

The Basement drop down allows you to choose whether you want to search on basements.

The Bedrooms and Full Baths drop downs allows you to choose either the exact number of each or the minimum number of each.

The Purchase Code drop down allows you to choose what type of purchase was made.

NOTE: The Search and Reset buttons are in two locations on the screen, but they function exactly the same way. They are in two locations for convenience.