About the Los Alamos County Clerk
Los Alamos County has an origin story unlike any other in New Mexico: it was created in 1949, not out of frontier settlement or ranching, but to give formal civil government to the community that had grown up around the top-secret Manhattan Project laboratory established in 1943. The name Los Alamos, Spanish for 'the cottonwoods,' predates the lab -- it originally belonged to a boys' boarding school, the Los Alamos Ranch School, whose campus and buildings the federal government seized almost overnight in late 1942 for what became Project Y, the effort that designed and built the first atomic bombs. Because the townsite was federal property for years afterward, Los Alamos developed as a planned community behind a security gate before New Mexico carved it into its own county and granted it a unique consolidated city-county charter. Los Alamos National Laboratory remains the county's dominant employer today, giving it the highest median household income and among the most highly educated populations of any county in the state. The county's second community, White Rock, sits on the mesa above the Rio Grande a few miles southeast of the townsite and developed largely as a residential area for lab employees.
Cities and Communities Served
Recording jurisdiction runs countywide, not by city limits — if the property sits anywhere within Los Alamos County, this is the Los Alamos County Clerk that will accept the deed. That includes:
Incorporated city: Los Alamos (county seat).
Unincorporated communities: White Rock.
Los Alamos is a consolidated city-county government -- the county itself functions as the incorporated municipality, so there is no separate city government layered on top.
Office Details
Address: 1000 Central Avenue, Suite 240, Los Alamos, NM 87544
Phone: (505) 662-8010
Hours: Monday - Friday, 8:00 AM - 5:00 PM
Recording Fee: New Mexico charges a flat, statute-set recording fee per document, with an added fee once a document runs past a set number of index entries -- not a percentage of the property's value. Contact the county clerk's office for current amounts.
Good to know before you go: The clerk's own recording FAQ flags 3:30-4:30 PM as the busiest stretch of the day for walk-ins, and anything turned in after 4:30 PM waits until the next business day to be processed.
How to File a Document
- Sign in Front of a Notary -- In Person or Remotely: New Mexico requires the grantor's signature to be acknowledged before a notary public before the Los Alamos County Clerk will accept a deed for recording. New Mexico has permitted remote online notarization on a permanent basis since January 1, 2022, under the state's Revised Uniform Law on Notarial Acts (NMSA 1978, Sections 14-14A-1 to 14-14A-32) -- the notary handling it must be commissioned and physically located in New Mexico at the time, even if you're signing from somewhere else.
- Attach a Full Legal Description, Not Just an Address: A street address alone won't satisfy New Mexico's requirements -- the deed needs the property's actual legal description (a metes-and-bounds description, a government survey reference, or a platted lot and block, depending on how the parcel was originally surveyed and subdivided), plus a reference to the prior deed that brought the property into the grantor's name, to keep the chain of title intact. You can usually copy the legal description directly from the deed that transferred the property to you.
- Get Both Spouses to Sign if It's Community Property: New Mexico is a community property state, and state law (NMSA 1978, Section 40-3-13) generally requires both spouses to join in a deed transferring community real property -- even when only one spouse's name appears on the title. Skipping the second signature doesn't necessarily void the transfer outright, but it leaves the deed open to being challenged, so it's worth confirming with the Los Alamos County Clerk or an attorney whether your specific situation calls for both signatures before you file.
- File a Real Property Transfer Declaration Affidavit With the Assessor: For most residential property transfers, New Mexico law (NMSA 1978, Section 7-38-12.1) also requires a separate Real Property Transfer Declaration Affidavit to be filed with the county assessor's office -- not the Los Alamos County Clerk -- within thirty days of recording the deed. It's a distinct step from recording itself, used to keep the assessor's records current for property tax purposes, and the assessor's office can supply the current form.
- Record With the County Clerk: Bring, mail, or (where the county supports it) e-file the signed, notarized deed with the Los Alamos County Clerk for the county where the property sits. New Mexico charges a flat, statute-set recording fee per document, with an added fee once a document runs past a set number of index entries -- never a percentage of the property's value -- and the state has no separate real estate transfer tax on top of it. The first page needs roughly an inch and a half of blank space at the top for the clerk's recording stamp, with the document's title placed just below it.
Still Have Questions About Filing With the Los Alamos County Clerk?
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Other Counties in New Mexico
Filing somewhere else in the state? Here are a few other county pages:
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