Posted by garland/CA on 8/20/11 10:18am
Msg #394351

South Carolina notaries question re: witnesses/help!

Have a quit claim deed to be signed in California for South Carolina property. It requires a witness to sign also. The notarial wording accompanying this, however, is confusing. It includes wording regarding the witness appearing before me and making oath they saw the grantor sign the document. In that case it appears the signature of the witness is being notarized.

Can anyone give me any more information on this?

Reply by jba/fl on 8/20/11 11:14am
Msg #394355

What I can say is that if you are notarizing the witness(es), you can not be a witness.

Reply by Les_CO on 8/20/11 11:19am
Msg #394357

First of all SC is an attorney State requiring an attorney to ‘supervise’ the closing if only by telephone. Secondly you will need two witnesses.(one can be the notary. however you can't notarize your signature) I haven’t seen the document but if it says to notarize the one of witness’s signature I’d do it (ask the attorney) I have notarized the witness’s signatures on wills here in CO. Not a lawyer JMO

Reply by garland/CA on 8/20/11 12:55pm
Msg #394362

thanks for the replies. There is no atttorney supervising this (Quit Claim Deed only). There are no instructions for that.
Also they said they only need one witness - though I read on-line that there seems to need to two witnesses, but they confirmed only one. I am not one of the witnesses.

Doesn't seem drawn up right, but I'll notarize their signatures and the witness on separate certificates, and that is all I can do.

Reply by Les_CO on 8/21/11 10:25am
Msg #394407

If that’s what they asked then that’s what I would have done too. If it does not record you can always go back and do it again for another fee !

Reply by Dave Heine on 8/21/11 11:55am
Msg #394413

This is called a notary by probate and is very common in South Carolina. They have there own wording same as other states.

The conveyance needs 2 witnesses and 1 may be the notary. Here is the difference, the grantors in the deed are required to sign in the presence of the witness who is not the notary. The wording will be something like, blah blah day appreared before me (witness 1 or 2) who blah blah blah.

If you are to notarize witness 1 then you can be witness 2, if you are notarizing witness 2 which is how my South Carolina Deeds read when we prepare them, then you can be witness 1.

What you are notarizing is the witness wether one or two saw the people execute the deed and you are notarizing that fact. That is why you have to watch how you fill out the certificate and which witness you become.

South Carolina is an attorney state, unless a party to the transaction prepared the quit claim deed.

Yes, it really is a funky certificate, but when you read through what you are doing it is pretty self explanitory.

Reply by garland/CA on 8/21/11 4:03pm
Msg #394424

thanks so much Dave. This is very helpful. So, in this case you are only notarizing the signature of the witness - not the Grantors? That is how it looked on the wording.

Reply by Dave Heine on 8/21/11 8:00pm
Msg #394437

that is 100% correct. It is weird, but that is how they do it in South Carolina.... which if you think about it, both sellers can sign in front of the witness who can bring you the document and say they witnessed the signing,.... so much easier unless of course you have to be the other witness, then you still need then present..