What a melkia actually is
And what it is not
A melkia is a form of customary title, drawn up by adouls — notaries working within the Moroccan legal tradition — that records ownership through a chain of witnessed acts. It is not a deed in the French sense; there is no single registry, no cadastre number, no plan attached at the moment of issuance.
This is the first thing buyers from European jurisdictions tend to misread. A melkia is not weaker than a titre foncier because it lacks a plan; it is a different instrument, serving a different purpose, with its own mechanisms for establishing and transferring ownership. Most of the medina is held on melkia. Most of the medina changes hands, year after year, on melkia, without drama.
What matters at the moment of purchase is not whether the property has "a title" but whether the melkia is clean: one or a small number of named owners, a continuous chain of transfers, and no registered disputes. The adoul establishes this before the sale; we ask our own questions alongside.