Posted by CaliNotary on 3/31/09 3:32am
Msg #282793

Please send 2 loose acknowlegments

Got a call today from a SS that I do a fair amount of work for. Did a signing on the 18th, there were 2 grant deeds to take the property out of trust for the loan. Due to the way the deeds were prepared, the notary wording was divided between the first and second page. I didn't think anything of it at the signing, completed em and sent em back.

Got a call today, the 30th, the TC wants 2 new acknowledgments because they know the deeds won't record with the notary wording split between 2 pages. I refused to do it unless they either returned the originals to me to correct or sent new blank ones to get resigned. Of course this led to the usual argument - no other notary has ever refused to do this, I'm going to lose the TC's business if you refuse, they HAVE to have it back tomorrow or the loan won't fund, blah blah blah. Long story short, they're sending me the originals to correct.

My question is, how much responsibility, if any, falls on my end? Was the notary wording issue something I should have known as a signing agent? The SS owner tried to tell me that there was something in the CA manual stating that all of the wording had to be on the same page, which sounded dubious to me, and when I checked the acknowledgment section in the manual it didn't say anything of the sort. It honestly didn't even occur to me that it might cause any kind of problem, there are plenty of recorded documents that have contents on more than one page and obviously that's not a problem, I wouldn't see why the notary wording would be any different.

If it happens again in the future I'll make sure I stamp the ack wording on the second page so it won't be an issue, I'm just wondering if this was something that should have been totally obvious to me and I just blew it? Obviously the one who blew it was whoever prepared the deed initially, just looking for opinions on how "wrong" I was in the whole matter.

Reply by BrendaTx on 3/31/09 6:17am
Msg #282795

In Texas it would record with no problem.

It happens often. It's not "pretty" in a doc preparer sense but it's not a problem. Sometimes when the doc preparer goes from the word processor program to PDF it repaginates itself and splits occur no matter who you think it shouldn't do that.

If you had demanded that they prepare the documents so that the ack was all on one page they could have said, "Who are you to tell doc prep how to draft and draw documents?"

I think they are just looking for "pretty" and perfection. A call to that h3ll which is your county recorder's office might reveal a final answer.

Reply by CaliNotary on 3/31/09 11:14am
Msg #282834

Re: In Texas it would record with no problem.

I wouldn't be surprised if you're right, that it's more about pretty than anything else.

I'll pass on the call to the recorder's office though

Reply by ReneeK_MI on 3/31/09 8:00am
Msg #282805

Doesn't pass the whiff test for me - closed on the 18th and STILL not funded? Isn't that just a little bit dusty by now? I'd be willing to bet it's not only funded, but recorded as well, and someone somewhere thinks it should look prettier for secondary market.

Reply by Calnotary on 3/31/09 9:23am
Msg #282819

I think Renee is correct. And one more thing that it's very frustrating; TC messed up the doc and you end up loosing the business with the SS. It has happend to me before that the LO,TC messes up or even Fed Ex did not picked the package and they always blamed the notary. I CAN'T BE RESPONSIBLE FOR SOMEBODY ELSE MISTAKES! I hope calinotary that you still get business from this SS because that's the modus operandi of some "good SSs".

Are you sending 2 loose acks with the original date?

Thank you

Reply by CaliNotary on 3/31/09 11:02am
Msg #282831

"Are you sending 2 loose acks with the original date?"

They're sending the originals to me, I'm just going to stamp them with the acknowledgment wording and void the old notarization. And yes, I'm using the original date, that's the only date the borrowers appeared in front of me.

Reply by NCLisa on 3/31/09 8:06am
Msg #282807

Here, the notary wording, sig and stamps must be on the same page. I automatically attach an ack if this happens. Ask them to overnight you the originals, and you'll attach a new ack to them and send them back.

Reply by Marian_in_CA on 3/31/09 12:07pm
Msg #282842

I do agree that it seems fishy that they're just getting back to you about this a week later. Odd.

At any rate... it's just a personal preference/interpretation but I would never put my seal on a notarial certificate that was not complete on a single page. I've seen the ack wording cross pages, but I've always ignored it.

The reason I prefer the block on a single page is because of how I interpret the rule, "...a notary public seal and signature cannot be affixed to a document without the correct notarial wording." To me, the document can be multiple pages, but the notarial wording is a certificate, something that is it's own little entity and (IMO) should be on a single page. There's no reason a notarial certificate needs to be on more than one page. In fact, on a lot of deeds I've seen, the ack is tacked on it's own page at the very end of the document. Unless all the wording is present on a "certificate", I won't put my seal on it. The certificate should either be fully contained on a page at the end of a document, or on a separate page.

I realize this is really more of a personal preference/personal business decision rather than a rule, though. I can't find anything in the handbook beyond what I've already quoted that really addresses this. But then, the handbook (as we all know) doesn't really cover a LOT of things!

Reply by CaliNotary on 3/31/09 9:17pm
Msg #282936

Thanks for the input. In the future, if I come across it again, I'll definitely make the correction on my own. Some battles, even if you're not in the wrong, are just not worth fighting when it's such a simple thing to avoid them in the first place.

Reply by MikeC/NY on 3/31/09 8:47pm
Msg #282923

I don't think you did anything wrong, and your reaction to what they wanted was exactly right - send the document so I can fix it, or let's do a re-sign.

You obviously know CA notary law, so you know whether an ack can span two pages. I think the comments from others about the TC or lender wanting the docs to "look pretty" are spot on... We have no requirements about this in NY, but the few times I've seen an acknowledgment spanning two pages, I've struck the original and added a loose ack. I guess this comes under the heading of "Best Practices"...

Reply by JanetK_CA on 4/1/09 1:41am
Msg #282949

I think you're right about this falling under "best practices", rather than a question of law. I don't think CA notary law addresses this at all - at least I don't recall ever seeing anything about it. Having said that, I also don't recall ever having seen notary verbiage span more than one page. I *have* seen an attorney's asst. go to great lengths to keep it on one page for a Grant Deed, but that could just as easily have been because there are additional filing fees for each additional page.