# How to skip trace vacant land owners

URL: https://skipmatch.com/guides/skip-tracing-vacant-land-owners
Last updated: 2026-10-02

## Key facts

- Price: a flat $0.03 a record at any list size from 50 to 100,000 records.
- Unit: Priced per matched record.
- Minimum order: 50 records
- Minimum charge: Minimum charge $0.50 when any record matches.
- Single search: Single search: $0.10, charged only on a match, paid from prepaid credit ($10 minimum top-up).
- Prepaid credit: Prepaid credit expires 12 months after your last credit purchase, single search or credit-paid list, and unused credit is refundable on request within 90 days of purchase.
- Free tool: Check your list free at /tools/skip-trace-csv-checker. Check columns, split addresses and download a fixed CSV in your browser before tracing at $0.03 a record. No account needed.
- Subscription: None. A list order is paid for on its own by card or prepaid credit.
- Max per order: 100,000 rows or 50 MB per file
- Output: Up to 10 phones per owner, each with its line type (mobile, landline or VoIP), plus emails where found
- Sources: 3 core providers: idiCORE, Enformion and Delvepoint
- Not for: FCRA uses: credit, insurance, employment or tenant screening
- Prices last changed: 2026-10-02
- Last updated: 2026-10-02

Skip trace vacant land owners on their mailing address, because a vacant parcel usually has no situs house number to search. Export the parcels from the county with the owner name and mailing address, look up rows that only carry a parcel number, keep your APN and acreage columns, and upload the list as one CSV.

## The short answer

A house can be traced from its street address. A vacant parcel usually cannot: its situs address is blank, a road name with no number, or a placeholder such as "0 Old Quarry Rd". The address that reaches the owner is the one the county mails the tax bill to, so that is the one the trace runs on. Everything else in a land list, the parcel number, the acreage, the zoning, rides along untouched so the results drop back onto your parcels.

- Step 1Export the parcels from the countyPull the parcels you want from the county assessor, tax office or GIS parcel map (or a land data platform) as a spreadsheet with the owner name, the owner's mailing address, the parcel number (APN) and the acreage.
- Step 2Trace on the owner's mailing addressA vacant parcel usually has no house number at its situs address, so the mailing address the tax bill goes to is the address that reaches the owner. Map it as the address for every row.
- Step 3Fix the rows that cannot be traced as they areLook up rows that carry only a parcel number, split owner names printed last-name-first into first and last name, and set aside rows with no owner name or no mailing address.
- Step 4Check the file, then upload it as a CSVSave the export as a CSV, run it through a CSV checker to see how each column maps, and upload it. Keep the APN and acreage columns in the file.
- Step 5Join the results back to your parcelsThe result file returns your own columns unchanged next to the phones and emails, so each owner's contacts line up with the parcel number they came from.

## Preparing the county parcel export

The export is where most land lists go wrong, long before any trace runs. The table below is what to do with each column. The header names are typical; yours will differ, and you do not need to rename anything, because you point each column at the right field during upload.

| Column in the export | What to do | Why |
| --- | --- | --- |
| OWNER_NAME, OWNER1 | Keep. Map it as the owner name, or split it into first and last name columns first. | Required: every row needs an owner name. |
| OWNER2, CO_OWNER | Keep if you like. It comes back unchanged but is not traced. | One owner name per row is traced; give a co-owner a row of their own to trace them too. |
| MAIL_ADDR, MAIL_CITY, MAIL_ST, MAIL_ZIP | Keep. Map all four as the mailing address. | Required on vacant land: it is the address that reaches the owner. |
| SITUS_ADDR, SITUS_CITY, SITUS_ZIP | Map as the property address only when it has a street number. | Often blank, a road name alone, "0 Old Quarry Rd" or "Lot 7" on vacant parcels. |
| APN, PARCEL_ID, PIN | Keep. Leave it unmapped. | Not traced; returned unchanged so results line up with parcels. |
| ACRES, ZONING, LAND_USE, ASSESSED_VALUE | Keep. Leave them unmapped. | Not traced; returned unchanged for sorting and filtering later. |

### Owner names printed last-name-first

Many tax rolls print the owner as SMITH JOHN A. A single owner-name column is read first name first, with the last word taken as the last name, unless a comma marks it as SMITH, JOHN. So either add the comma or, better, split the column into first-name and last-name columns in your spreadsheet before you upload. Joint names such as SMITH JOHN & MARY are worth splitting the same way.

### Rows with no owner name or no mailing address

A county export usually has a few: parcels owned by the county or a utility, rows where the mailing address field is empty, rows with only a parcel number. Every row left in the file is counted in the quote, so look them up at the county or take them out before you upload.

### One owner, several parcels

An owner who holds five lots appears five times in a county export. Rows that match on every field you map are exact duplicates: they are counted once, and the result file carries the first of them. Keep your original export so you can copy that owner's phones onto the other parcels by owner name and mailing address.

### File format and size

The upload takes a CSV of 50 to 100,000 rows, up to 50 MB. Save an Excel export as CSV first. A county pull larger than 100,000 parcels goes in as more than one order, and each order is priced by its own size.

## APN-only rows

Skipmatch does not accept a parcel number on its own. Every row needs an owner name and a complete address, so a list of APNs has to be turned into owners first: search each parcel number on the county assessor's site or GIS map and copy the owner name and mailing address into the row. Keep the APN column; it comes back unchanged. Skip tracing by parcel number walks through that county step.

If you would rather not do the lookup, two other services published an APN option when we checked:

- Tracerfy lists a parcel (APN) trace at 5 credits per hit, $0.10 a hit at its pay-as-you-go credit price and $0.05-$0.07 a hit at its monthly plan credit prices (tracerfy.com/pricing, checked 2026-09-25). Skipmatch vs Tracerfy.
- Bulk Skip Trace lists a bulk property search by parcel number (APN) or street address (bulkskiptrace.com, checked 2026-09-25). Check its own pages for what that search costs. Skipmatch vs Bulk Skip Trace.

Both are quoted as of Sept 2026 from each company's own pages. Nothing here says anything about either service's match rates or data quality.

## Out-of-state and entity owners

Vacant land is often owned from far away: acreage inherited by children who moved, lots bought sight unseen. That changes nothing about the file. Trace on the mailing address exactly as the county has it, in whatever state it is, and do not swap in the parcel's own city or ZIP. If the mailing address reads "c/o" an attorney or a management company, it reaches them, not the owner, and the name on the row is still the one traced.

Land lists often name an LLC, a family trust or an estate as the owner, and those rows need no special handling in the file. A single owner-name column that reads as an entity (LLC, Inc, trust, estate) is kept whole rather than split into first and last name. A trace on an entity's name may not reach the person who runs it; the reliable route there is manual: the state's business entity search for an LLC, the trustee for a trust, the probate record for an estate. How to skip trace an LLC-owned property covers the LLC steps. For a handful of hard owners, a service that sells single manual searches can be the better tool than a bulk list; Skipmatch vs SmartSkip sets out that trade.

## What comes back

The file you uploaded, row for row (less any exact duplicates removed at upload), with columns added after your own:

- Up to 10 phone numbers per owner, ranked, each labelled mobile, landline or VoIP.
- Up to 3 email addresses where they exist. None are guessed.
- A match flag on every row: HIT when at least one phone or email came back, MISS when none did.
- Your own columns, APN and acreage included, unchanged and in their original order.

The sample file shows the layout with invented records. Calls and texts to owners are regulated by the TCPA, state rules and the do-not-call registries; follow them before you dial. This is general information, not legal advice; see the permissible-use terms.

## Price at 10,000, 25,000 and 50,000 parcels

Skipmatch charges per matched record: $0.03 a record at any list size. The price is under 5 cents a record on every list. The quote is shown before you pay, and it is the most the list can cost. Minimum charge $0.50 when any record matches.

| Parcels | Skipmatch, a record | Skipmatch, at most | Land Portal at $0.10 default, plus a plan | Land Portal as low as $0.04 (Pro, bulk tokens), plus a plan |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 10,000 | $0.03 | $300.00 | $1,000.00 | $400.00 |
| 25,000 | $0.03 | $750.00 | $2,500.00 | $1,000.00 |
| 50,000 | $0.03 | $1,500.00 | $5,000.00 | $2,000.00 |

## What Land Portal publishes

Land Portal is a data, GIS and CRM platform built for land investors, with skip tracing sold on top of a plan. As of Sept 2026, its plans start at $59 a month, and its skip tracing is $0.10 a record by default, as low as $0.05 on Starter and Advanced or $0.04 on Pro with bulk tokens (help.landportal.com: how to bulk skip trace, landportal.com/subscriptions). On Enterprise annual plans it lists $0.015 per successful record, below Skipmatch's price; Enterprise starts from $650 a month (landportal.com/enterprise, checked 2026-09-25). If you already pay for Land Portal to pull and map parcels, tracing inside it keeps the list in one place. Skipmatch suits a county export you already have, with no plan to keep paying for.

| Service | Published price | Billed on | Subscription | Unmatched records | Minimum | Source |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Skipmatch | $0.03 (any list size) | Per matched record | No | Never charged: released from the checkout hold | 50 records | This site |
| Land Portal | Plans at $59, $99 and $199 a month (Enterprise from $650; the compare table prints $59.95 and $99.95). Skip tracing is 10¢ per record by default, as low as 5¢ (Starter/Advanced) or 4¢ (Pro) with bulk tokens, and $0.015 per successful record on Enterprise annual plans; Enterprise monthly bundles include 10,000 to 100,000 skip traces. 7-day free trial. | Per record via tokens on top of a monthly plan | Yes | Enterprise annual pricing is per successful record; not stated otherwise | A paid plan from $59 a month | landportal.com/subscriptionslandportal.com/enterprisehelp.landportal.com: how to bulk skip trace |

- For land investors
- Skip trace by parcel number
- CSV checker
- LLC-owned property
- Cost calculator

## Questions

Q: How do I find the owner of vacant land?
A: Search the parcel on the county assessor's or tax office's website, or click it on the county's GIS parcel map. The record shows the owner's name as it appears on the tax roll and the mailing address the tax bill goes to. Searching is usually free. For every parcel in an area, export the list from the county GIS or a land data platform instead of looking parcels up one at a time.

Q: Which address do I use when there is no house?
A: Use the owner's mailing address from the tax record. A vacant parcel usually has no house number at its situs address, so there is nothing at the property to search on; the mailing address is where the owner gets the tax bill. If the situs address does have a street number, add it as the property address as well.

Q: How do I skip trace a county parcel list?
A: Export the parcels with the owner name and mailing address, split names printed last-name-first into first and last name, look up or remove rows with no owner name or no mailing address, and keep the APN and acreage columns. Save it as a CSV, check how the columns map, and upload it. The phones and emails come back on the same rows, next to your parcel numbers.

Q: What if one owner holds several parcels?
A: Leave every parcel in the file. Rows that match on every field you map are exact duplicates: they are counted once, and the result file carries the first of them. Rows for the same owner that differ in any mapped field, such as a different situs address, are each counted. Keep your original export so you can copy the owner's phones onto each of their parcels by owner name and mailing address.

Q: How do I contact vacant land owners?
A: Skip trace each owner on the mailing address from the county tax record. The result adds up to 10 ranked phone numbers, each labelled mobile, landline or VoIP, and up to 3 email addresses where they exist, on the same row as the parcel. The mailing address also takes a letter, so a list can be mailed and called together. For an LLC, trust or estate owner, start with the state's business entity search or the probate record.