Rhode Island Land Records is a free website for researching land online. It’s by no means complete but is a starting point for finding Land Evidence Records from the 1800s to present in some towns and cities and each town/city has a link to their official website.

Researchers can search by name and it’s helpful to search by recorded land plans as well as recorded land.

As one of the original 13 colonies, Rhode Island is what is known as a “State Land” state. Rhode Island did not cede unclaimed land to the federal government when it became a state. Rhode Island had its own land offices to distribute land and researchers will have to look to each city/town to find historic Rhode Island land records.

“Unlike most other states, the State of Rhode Island maintains separate land evidence records for each of its 39 cities and towns. Since the town or city clerk of each municipality is responsible for maintaining these records there is no uniform system for searching the land evidence records.”

“A number of cities and towns have converted their land evidence records to electronic document management systems. Of those, some – but not all – have made their records available for online searching. The quality of these sites also varies, as does the ability to print copies of these documents outside of the town or city hall. Some systems allow free online printing, some charge a fee for this service and some do not allow it at all.”