Massachusetts notary public law

New Notary Public Act Addresses Unauthorized Practice of Law, Title Issues and Consumer Protection

by Rich Vetstein on January 12, 2017

in Deeds, Land Court, Mortgages, Notary Public, Title Defects


notary-public-2An Act Regulating Notaries Public to Protect Consumers And The Validity And Effectiveness Of Recorded Instruments

On October 6, 2016 Governor Charlie Baker signed Chapter 289 of the Acts of 2016, An Act Regulating Notaries Public to Protect Consumers And The Validity And Effectiveness Of Recorded Instruments. The Act is a product of cooperation between the Real Estate Bar Association and the title industry. The Act officially codifies Mitt Romney’s Executive Order No. 455 (04-04), which in 2004 reformed the standards of conduct for notaries.  It also codifies the prohibition that a notary public cannot oversee and conduct a real estate closing; only a licensed attorney can handle closings. It also addresses several bankruptcy court rulings which called into question the effectiveness of notary acknowledgements involving powers of attorney.

Unauthorized Practice of Law
In the last decade, the practice of so-called “witness-only closings,” or “notary closings,” by non-lawyer notaries has spread from other states to Massachusetts. This practice has been vigorously opposed by REBA which filed a successful lawsuit effectively barring the practice in REBA v. National Real Estate Information Services, 459 Mass. 512 (2011). The Act codifies the rule of law that a non-attorney notary may only notarize documents but may not conduct a real estate closing. Only licensed attorneys may conduct real estate closings in Massachusetts.

Title Curative Provisions

Recent rulings from the Bankruptcy Court called into question the validity of mortgages with notary acknowledgements involving powers of attorney. The result of these rulings were that many mortgages were held null and void due to defective acknowledgements. The Act addresses these issues by providing, among other things:

● A revision to the standard acknowledgment clause, when the document is executed by the signatory in other than an individual capacity, to assist the notary in making clear that the document is the voluntary act of the principal, not merely the signatory [M.G.L. c. 222, § 15(b)]
● Notaries may vary from the forms set forth in the statute if they are using a form that is authorized or required by statute, regulation or executive order, including one executed in a representative capacity by one who acknowledges his voluntary act but fails to acknowledge the deed or instrument as the voluntary act of the principal or grantor [M.G.L. c. 183, § 42, as revised] [M.G.L. c. 222, §§15(h), 20]
● Failure to state that a document signed by an attorney in fact or in another representative capacity is in fact being signed as the voluntary act of the principal, not merely the signatory, shall not make the document invalid.  [M.G.L. c. 222, § 20(b)(iii)]

Other Provisions

Chapter 289 includes most of the Executive Order’s provisions, some in a modified form. The legislation also added other new provisions in M.G.L. cc. 183 and 222 —

● Notaries shall continue to maintain a chronological official journal of notarial acts, except that attorneys and their office staff shall continue to be exempt from this requirement.  [M.G.L. c. 222, §§ 12, 22, 24]
● Requirements for the notarial seal or stamp (expiration date affixed, exclusive property of the notary, etc.), except that a failure to comply shall not affect the validity of any instrument or the record thereof [M.G.L. c. 222, § 8, as revised]
● Qualifications for a notary; the grounds for which the Governor may decline an application for appointment or renewal of a notary commission, and the seven-year term of office, all as incorporated into the statute [M.G.L. c. 222, §§ 13, 14]
● Types of notarial acts that a notary may perform and prescribed forms for an acknowledgment, jurat, signature witnessing or copy certification [M.G.L. c. 222, § 15]
● Obligations of the notary to determine the appropriateness of the circumstances under which the notary is asked to perform a notarial act (identity and demeanor of the principal, incomplete notarial certificates, no undue influence by the notary, the notary’s relationship to the transaction or to the parties, etc.) [M.G.L. c. 222, §§ 16, 19, 20]
● Prohibition against notarizing signatures of family members shall not apply to notaries who are Massachusetts attorneys, as when the attorney takes the acknowledgement of an employee family member who witnesses a will, as provided in the Executive Order, but also if the family member employed by the attorney is the notary who takes the acknowledgement of the attorney.  [M.G.L. c. 222, § 16(a) (vii)]
● Failure of a document to contain the statutory forms shall not have any effect on the validity of the document or the recording thereof.  [M.G.L. c. 222, §§ 16, 19, 20]
● Notary public’s commission may be revoked for official misconduct, or for other good cause.  [M.G.L. c. 222, §§ 1, 26]

For more information, go to the Mass.gov Notary Public Page.

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Attorney Affidavit Approved To Cure Defective Mortgage Notary Acknowledgment

by Rich Vetstein on September 23, 2016

in Closings, Massachusetts Real Estate Law, Mortgages, Title Defects, Title Insurance

notary-public

SJC Decision Provides Clarity to Title Attorneys

Now that the summer is over, it’s time to get back to blogging! During the quiet summer months, the Supreme Judicial Court issued an important decision for real estate attorneys and the title community in Bank of America v. Casey (June 16, 2016) (link to case). The SJC confirmed that a statutory curative attorney’s affidavit may be recorded with the registry of deeds correcting a defective notary acknowledgment on a mortgage which otherwise could have invalidated the instrument. This is a very helpful decision, and should result in more titles (and properties) being cleared and sold.

Defective Notary Acknowledgment

In 2005, Alvaro and Lisa Pereira refinanced their New Bedford property with Bank of America, N.A. The Pereiras individually initialed the bottom of each page of the mortgage agreement except the signature page, on which the full signature of each appears. Attorney Raymond J. Quintin, the closing attorney, also signed this page, as the notary to the Pereiras’ execution of the mortgage. The mortgage agreement contains a certificate of acknowledgment (acknowledgment) on a separate page. The Pereiras individually initialed the acknowledgment page at the bottom, but the acknowledgment itself is blank in the space designated for the names of the persons appearing before the notary public, and the Pereiras’ names do not appear elsewhere on the page. Quintin notarized the acknowledgment, affixing his signature and his notary public seal. 

Seven years later (which is unexplained in the ruling), Attorney Quintin signed and recorded an “Attorney’s Affidavit, M.G.L. Ch. 183, Sec. 5B” stating that he properly witnessed the Pereiras signing the mortgage and that “through inadvertence, the names of the parties executing this mortgage, Lisa M. Pereira and Alvaro M. Pereira, were omitted from the notary clause.” Parenthetically, these curative affidavits are quite common in the industry.

Approximately six months later, Mr. Pereira filed for bankruptcy and sought to be released from responsibility under the mortgage on the ground that the mortgage contained a material defect — the omission of the mortgagors’ names from the acknowledgment.

SJC–Attorney Affidavits Pursuant to G.L. c. 183, sec. 5B May Cure Defective Notary Acknowledgment

The Court first went over the general rule that a defective notary acknowledgment is usually grounds to void any recordable instrument altogether. Mass. General Laws chapter 183 section 5B provides a cure to this problem by providing that “an affidavit made by a person claiming to have personal knowledge of the facts therein stated and containing a certificate by an attorney at law that the facts stated in the affidavit are relevant to the title to certain land and will be of benefit and assistance in clarifying the chain of title may be filed for record and shall be recorded in the registry of deeds where the land or any part thereof lies.”

The Court then ruled that the curative affidavit recorded by the closing attorney cured the defect and validated the mortgage. The Court said the attorney’s affidavit must comply with the formal requirements of § 5B, attests to facts that clarify the chain of title by supplying information omitted from the originally recorded acknowledgement, and references the previously recorded mortgage. As long as it does that, the problem is solved.

This isn’t a “sexy” opinion, but it is nevertheless important to the real estate bar and community.

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