Legal Documents and Why They Need To Be Notarized
by Abdul Aziz Mondal Business Security Systems Published on: 22 January 2019 Last Updated on: 04 January 2023
In America, more than 1 billion legal documents get notarized every year because it is considered very helpful to different people in the country. The notarization process is usually carried out by a notary public who acts as a legal commissioner whereby he witnesses the signing against the legal documents, such as Оформление доверенности (issuing power of attorney), identify the signers, and place a notary seal or verify these documents. You should know that it is not every official document that requires it to be notarized. For a document to be notarized it needs to have elements such as text that commits the signer, an original signature from the signer, and a notarial certificate appearing on the document or coming as an attachment.
Who Can Notarize Your Documents And How Do You Do It?
Every state has its own rules and regulations in regard to notaries and notary public. Some may need their public notaries to take an examination to evaluate their qualifications, and others get the authority to act as one by virtue of being lawyers. However, whichever way qualifies them as public notaries, they must abide by the rules and regulations put in place. Each state also determines the government department that will oversee the notaries and how long each commission will last as a public notary. You may find that a notary public in one state can do more than witnessing and verifying signatures and administering oaths while in other states that is all he can do. For instance in Florida, a notary public can perform a marriage as long as the people involved have a wedding license that is valid.
A notary public can only notarize a legal document if the individual whose signature is being notarized is present. This means that the documents cannot be signed in advance before bringing it to the notary. In some states, the notary may want to know how you identified the signer of the document and may also require the signer to affirm under oath that all the agreements contained in the document are true. The public notaries charge a fee to get the documents notarized, and this fee is usually regulated by state law in your region.
To get your legal documents notarized, you can either visit a public notary office or rely on electronic notarization. If the e-notarization sounds more convenient for you, and if your state offers these services, the notary public will affix a digital signature to a readable electronic document.
If you decide to go physically to the notary office, you can go online and access notary offices in your state. However, on both occasions, the document signor will be required to appear to the notary in person. Luckily things have changed, and it is now possible to have someone come to where you are and get your documents notarized. By clicking the following link, you can ask about this convenient service: find notaries near me. In this case, once you find a notary near you, communicate with them and schedule an appointment.
Benefits of Notarizing Your Documents:
1. Shield against Fraud:
Notarizing your legal documents is one efficient way of protecting them from fraud because the process acts as an additional layer of verification. The public notary ensures that the people who signed these documents are who they claim to be. In some states, notarization is a compulsory requirement for some documents or agreements such as mortgages, title deeds, power of attorney, living will, and easements among others. This means that no other person can claim to use them in any way as long as the signors have proved to the public notary that they are who they say they are.
2. Evidence in Times of Disputes:
In case you have a dispute that has been litigated, any affidavit tabled may not be considered by a court in case it is not notarized. It is good to notarize such sworn statements because they can be used as evidence in a court proceeding. In this case, do not wait for your valid legal documents to be denied in court or any other place where you planned to use them as evidence simply because you ignored the importance of notarization.
3. Provides Self-Authentication:
Once your documents get notarized, they become self-authenticating which means that the person who signed them will not need to attest in court to validate the legitimacy of the signatures. Again, no one else can claim ownership of these documents as long as they are notarized.
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