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Property and cadastre

New Zealand does not have one polygon that means the property for every purpose. The land-title system, cadastre, addressing system, rating/valuation systems and Māori Land Court records are connected but distinct.

For whenua Māori owners, trusts, iwi and hapū researchers, marae and papakāinga planners, and GIS practitioners, that distinction matters because several administrative records can appear to describe the same place while answering different questions.

The most useful shorthand in this section is:

parcel ≠ title ≠ property ≠ rating unit ≠ address ≠ Māori land block

Start with the relationship​

Conceptual flow

This is conceptual, not a data model. Real relationships can be one-to-many in several directions.

Questions this section helps answer​

A whenua or property investigation may begin with questions such as:

  • Which LINZ parcel contains this place?
  • Is one Māori land block represented by several cadastral parcels?
  • Which Record of Title is connected to a parcel?
  • Does the address point sit on the parcel people expect?
  • Why does a council rating unit not match the title or parcel boundary?
  • What survey plan or legal description sits behind the current cadastral geometry?
  • How does an access road, paper road or easement relate to the whenua?
  • What should be taken from Pātaka Whenua and what should be taken from LINZ?

The GIS is useful because these records can be viewed together without pretending they are the same record.

Guides​

For Māori land, start with Māori land data. For a full place-based investigation, use Investigating whenua.

Public GIS data versus land records​

The LINZ Data Service is excellent for national GIS layers such as parcels, addresses, survey information and title-related datasets. A downloaded polygon is a spatial representation from that system. When the question is about the registered Record of Title or survey evidence, the underlying land record is the source to inspect.

LINZ also publishes some ownership-related information under additional access and licensing conditions because it contains personal information. Dataset pages explain the current access model.

Māori land sits across connected systems​

A Māori land block is not simply another name for a cadastral parcel. Pātaka Whenua and Māori Land Court records describe the court/title context for Māori land, while LINZ maintains the cadastral framework and registered land records used for other legal and survey purposes.

For hapū, trusts and whenua Māori researchers, useful GIS work often keeps both systems visible. One can help locate and understand the block while the other helps investigate parcel geometry, survey plans, roads, addresses and neighbouring land.

See Block, parcel and title and Māori land blocks versus parcels.

The old property pilot​

Older material may refer to a LINZ property-data pilot. The current programme is the New Zealand Property Spine. It connects address, title, parcel and building concepts around a property identifier and includes National District Valuation Roll information. Access to the NZ Properties dataset is currently limited to specified public-sector and Crown organisations, so it is not a general replacement for open cadastral data.

See New Zealand Property Spine.

Practical next steps​

Last reviewed: 26 August 2026

Last updated on