Houston County Warranty Deed (Individual Grantor) Form

One record owner, one signature line, one acknowledgment certificate: the Alabama Warranty Deed (Individual Grantor) is configured for a single natural person conveying Alabama real estate with express general warranty covenants. Its first entry block pairs the grantor's name and mailing address with a marital status line, the recitation an Alabama probate judge looks for before accepting a deed made by an individual grantor (Ala. Code § 35-4-73).

The single-grantor architecture

The form recites exactly one grantor, who signs at the foot of the deed in the manner Ala. Code § 35-4-20 describes and acknowledges the signature before a notary public or another officer listed in Ala. Code § 35-4-24. The certificate printed on the form carries the substance of the individual acknowledgment in Ala. Code § 35-4-29: the person whose name is signed to the foregoing conveyance, known to the officer and informed of the contents of the conveyance, executed it voluntarily on the day it bears date. Because an acknowledgment operates as compliance with the witness provisions of Section 35-4-20 (Ala. Code § 35-4-23), the form carries no subscribing witness lines. Co-owners conveying together, spouses joining in one deed, and entity or fiduciary grantors present signature and recital patterns this form does not recite.

Express covenants past the statutory implication

Alabama attaches implied covenants to the words grant, bargain, or sell in a fee conveyance, but Ala. Code § 35-4-271 limits that implication to encumbrances done or suffered by the grantor and to quiet enjoyment against the grantor and the grantor's heirs and assigns. A general warranty deed promises more, so this form states the full covenants expressly: that the grantor is lawfully seized in fee simple, has a good right to sell and convey, that the property is free from encumbrances except the matters the deed lists, and that the grantor warrants and will forever defend the title against the lawful claims of all persons. The exceptions section draws the boundary of that promise, since taxes, easements, and recorded restrictions listed there are carved out of the covenant against encumbrances.

From entry blocks to the record

The deed collects its entries in numbered sections: grantor and marital status, grantee with mailing address, consideration, the county and formal legal description, the street address, the source of title, and the exceptions to warranty. The legal description comes word for word from the vesting deed, and where it refers to a plat, Ala. Code § 35-4-74 expects the plat book and recording office to be identified, the plat to be attached, or a metes and bounds description to appear. The consideration entry feeds the deed tax calculation of fifty cents per five hundred dollars of value, or fraction, under Ala. Code § 40-22-1, along with the sales validation information (Department of Revenue Form RT-1 or proof of the actual purchase price) probate offices collect with a deed.

The homestead line around a married grantor

Alabama abolished dower and curtesy decades ago, yet one spousal rule still reaches lifetime conveyances: under Ala. Code § 6-10-3, a married person's homestead cannot be validly conveyed without the spouse's voluntary signature and assent, shown by examination before an authorized officer and by that officer's certificate. This form carries a single signature line and no spousal joinder block; a conveyance inside the Section 6-10-3 homestead rule presents a two-signature pattern this deed does not recite. The marital status line in Section 1 is the entry the recording statute reads first, and a knowingly false recitation is a misdemeanor.

Built for the probate office counter

Recording runs county by county through the judge of probate, so the printed page matters as much as the words. The form reserves a three inch band at the top of page one for the recording stamp, prints the preparer endorsement in the statutory style of Ala. Code §§ 35-4-110 and 35-4-113 (a recordation prerequisite), and carries a return address block and a printed name beneath the signature, the entries county intake desks read before anything else. A general warranty deed is the broadest promise an Alabama property deed form makes, and the package prepares the whole of it: the fillable warranty deed form, a completed example showing a realistic Madison County transfer, and a guide that walks through each section, the signing formalities, and recording with the judge of probate. The materials are informational and are not legal advice.