Posted by Lester on 4/20/04 8:53pm
Msg #1574

Help

I'm a new signing agent in Medina,OH.Any help in getting up and running would be appreciated.I have listed myself with five or six signing services. Is there anything else I can or should be doing to market myself or to get this off the ground. Thanks in advance

Reply by Brenda Stone on 4/20/04 9:58pm
Msg #1575

In general:
1)Read posts on this site and gomobilenotary.com relating to new signing agents.
2) Set up a website
[ ]Include the zip codes you will service, how much you will charge in addition to the base fee, for mileage and copy/print per page.
[ ]Try putting a picture of yourself (preferaby in a professional setting and high quality) on your site. Whenever I do that with a web-based business, my sales go up. I like to do business online better--or at least I think I find it more compelling-- if I know what the other person looks like.
3) Sign up with as many companies as you can do everyday. If you do this, perhaps you will have your first job, start gaining contacts and assignments, within as little time as a month. When reading the postings as mentioned in number one, make a list of the signing agents that will not pay, then, go to the companies list on this site (if you have access--I am not sure if non-paying members have that, or not) Visit each of them that are not on your "bad" list, and if you are willing to work for them, sign up with them.
4)Look for the link to the free how-to lessons on www.50statenotary.com by Victoria Ring and read the ebook she has there. It is accurate and thorough.
5)Check out the materials on justpointandsign.com if you'd like detailed reference material
6)

None of my tips are any great revelation, I realize. But, hopefully they will help. Brenda

Reply by Lester on 4/21/04 8:38am
Msg #1582

Brenda,Thanks for the info.Guess I'm just impatient.I got started signing up with services last weekend.I will keep plugging away.

Reply by klb in texas on 4/26/04 1:07am
Msg #1651

Brenda,
I'm a new NSA in Texas, and just did my first two closings this past weekend. I wish I'd had these websites to review last week! I hadn't been able to find anything to review the documents before I actually had them in hand, on my way to the closing.
Thanks for posting these sites. I've printed quite a few pages to put in a binder for quick reference, and really appreciate the help.
I'll be much more prepared in the next closings that I do.
Thanks,
Karen

Reply by Brenda Stone on 4/27/04 6:32pm
Msg #1690

For KLB

Karen, I am so glad that you found these sites helpful. Victoria's newsletters are full of helpful information. She writes well and you will never waste your time on her newsletter. It is one of the few newsletters I get right to when it comes.

I have learned a mountainful of information reading here and always find something useful at gomobilenotary.com.

Please email me if you have any specific questions and we can look for answers together since I am not exactly an old timer, either. I have found that Texas is supposedly one of the most involved document packages. This is what I am told by the signing agencies. I was glad it was after a couple of signings or I would have be really worried! I cannot imagine how hard it must have been to go at your first ones blind. I really needed what I was able to get out of the info at 50statenotary.com before my first signing. Good to hear from you!

Brenda
[e-mail address]

Reply by sue on 4/28/04 6:46am
Msg #1693

Re: For KLB

while Victoria Ring's newsletter is appreciated, don't take it as the Bible. I personally think she is very naive about this business. Find out how many closings she does a week - I'd bet it's not very many and I'd further bet they're not with the top paying title companies (as evidenced by her acceptance of e-mail comments) The other week she made a statement indicating she didn't know why anyone would need E & O Insurance for title abstracing because 'it's just copying public records like doing geneaology (sp?)'. If that's all she thinks title abstracting is, I personally don't think she should't be offering input on the subject. Read her newsletters, learn from them but again, don't rely on them as gospel.

Reply by PAW Notary Services on 4/28/04 10:12pm
Msg #1714

Re: For KLB

I too would like to add that anyone should read Victoria's newsletter very carefully and question the content. Her intentions are most honorable and well founded, but she doesn't always provide the accuracy that is demanded. Further she doesn't investigate her own writing, repeating what she has heard or received in emails without any follow-up.

I have been told, though I haven't investigated it myself yet, that her training guide is fraught with errors. As I said, I don't offer this as first hand knowledge, but considering some things that I have read over the past year or so, I wouldn't be surprised.

In my opinion, she offers bad advise too frequently. For example, in Issue 16 she stated, "personally I have never had a problem giving out my social security number or driver’s license number to title and mortgage companies I sign up with online". I would never suggest to anyone to provide their SSN and/or DL number online, unless the site is a secured website (https), which just about all are not. Further, I sent her a reply that she never acknowledged:
---------------------------------------
SSN - You are not required (in relation to working) to provide your SSN to anyone but an employer. You are required to provide a Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN), which may be your SSN or an EIN or one of a few other identification numbers that are available. As an Independent Contractor, not an employee, it is strongly recommended that the Notary obtain an Employer Identification Number from the IRS. The EIN can then be provided to agencies and companies that need to pay you and report that income to the IRS. As a sole proprietor you have the option of using your SSN or an EIN for tax purposes. As a partnership, LLC or corporation, you need to have an EIN. Any self-employed business person can obtain an EIN easily and quickly (within minutes of applying). Simply go to the IRS website and apply. (http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/article/0,,id=97860,00.html)

Drivers License Numbers - There is absolutely no reason that any agency or company needs this information. There is nothing on your drivers license that is required to be provided as an Independent Contractor, nor a notary. Even signing agents are not required to have a drivers license. Further, having the drivers license number can open the doors to easy, unwanted and unnecessary gathering of personal data. Again, for privacy and identity theft prevention, keep your drivers license in your wallet or purse and provide it only to law enforcement or similar agencies. I have never had an agency refuse my application because I chose not to provide my drivers license information.

Along these lines, there is usually one other piece of information that some agencies frequently ask for: a copy of your seal. Most states forbid the use of a notary seal on anything except official notarizations. Agencies do not need a copy of your seal to verify your commission. Simply include a copy of your Notary Commission (or license or appointment) in lieu of your stamp. That will be accepted.

Reply by Brenda Stone on 4/29/04 12:15pm
Msg #1729

For KLB and Thanks, Sue & Paw

I, for one, am always ready to learn. Your comments have been well-noted by me. This is the kind of thing I think we can all benefit from.

Perhaps we can start a thread of providing excellent references, our own personal experience to doing well in this business, in other words-- a thread devoted to new signing agents' needs for education in the spirit of helpfulness.

Also, perhaps so that the thread is one in understanding of the budget some of us may be forced to be bound to. Fortunately, I had the ability to use some funds to advertise and to buy information to read. I think Victoria's is the most sensible.

For new signing agents who have more to spend on education, there are some very detailed books they can buy online. But from all my reading online, big budgets do not seem to be the common theme in new signing agents. This is how I came to refer Victoria.

For what it is worth--from only my humbly and short-time accrued experience: My best advice is to someone with little or no experience is take the loan document package, read the instructions provided in the package, read your contract you have signed, and read info by the signing agency you are working for (on their site)--then, re-read it all. You will be more prepared that way. At the signing, advance carefully and attentively one document at a time beginning with the document you have been told by your hiring entity to start with (which may be stated in one of the documents I have mentioned above, and you will not know it if you do not read all of these first).

It is a very big responsiblity to be a signing agent, I agree. However, it is not neurosurgery. Our responsiblity is not to be title companies, loan officers or title company closing agents without additional authority given--some of us are given additional authority, but not usually. The responsibility I speak of is responsibility is within the realm of signing agents. This means we are loan document familiar and a bit more educated notaries who must concentrate in that case on
(1) being on time, courteous, professionally dressed, prompt and dependable
(2) correctly adhering to notary rules commissioned by our state
(3) being willing to do what we are hired to do; that is, as the hiring entities' (lenders, title companies, or signing agencies) rules dictate as long as it does not conflict with our notary commission rules
(4) learning and understanding the language of the documents so we can read through confusing parts for the borrowers with them
(5) keeping our opinions to ourselves about the loan documents
(6) remaining professional and objective
(7) refer to our notice of right to cancel included in the package to assure the borrowers and that they can cancel if they sign at your appointment and decide they have an issue with the documents or call the signing agent, title company or lender we are working for, then,
(8) returning documents as we have agreed to under our contracts with the hiring entity .

My statements on this will catch a lot of flack, I am sure, but professional common sense is a big part of what we do, and if we do not have that no amount of reading or courses or certification will ever compensate for it.

I am new by most of the notaries posting here, so perhaps I have some difficult lessons to learn, but if I find issues that go outside of what I have stated herein, I will not continue this profession for the longhaul. That would be my only choice.

I have completed 19 assignments in six weeks without a hitch since being a new notary signing agent. I still cannot see that there are so many problems to overcome if you pay attention to what you do and take your time to review the instructions and the work after it is finished before you return it.

Anyone who reads anything written by Victoria or any other author of publications on the subject will surely need to use common sense to lead them through the process of this business.

I write this for people like KLB who have gone through the process of trying to get hard facts on how to do this like I have, and who like myself, want to learn to do this as best that I can. I am enjoying this job and hope for others to benefit from anything I can share with them. I invite more experienced SA's to correct my inexperienced comments they find so that we can all benefit as we learn this business.

Brenda

Reply by anonymous on 4/29/04 12:50pm
Msg #1732

Re: For KLB and Thanks, Sue & Paw

quote from Brenda

"For what it is worth--from only my humbly and short-time accrued experience: My best advice is to someone with little or no experience is take the loan document package, read the instructions provided in the package, read your contract you have signed, and read info by the signing agency you are working for (on their site)--then, re-read it all. You will be more prepared that way. At the signing, advance carefully and attentively one document at a time beginning with the document you have been told by your hiring entity to start with (which may be stated in one of the documents I have mentioned above, and you will not know it if you do not read all of these first). "

I totally agreed. I have been working as a notary and had worked for signing companies and I've seen that alot of the time notaries do not read the agreement and instructions included. It does help tremendously, that is the purpose why they included those instructions.

Reply by Mary T on 4/30/04 5:50pm
Msg #1765

That is not enough. You have to sign up with as many companies as you can. Sign up with all the FREE ones.

Mary T
[e-mail address]