Question: As an employee of a local title company, I would like to please have you clarify your article on quit claim deeds, to prevent any frustrations on consumers’ expectations of what a local escrow and title company can provide them.
Our escrow officers are limited-practice officers. They can only prepare quit claim deeds related to specific transactions. If we are not closing an escrow regarding refinancing or selling your property, we cannot legally prepare documents for you. Only you or your attorney could prepare the documents.
Our website does provide blank quit claim deeds consumers may download and use for free. Our customer service department can pull the last recorded deed of record that appears on your chain of title for free.
We cannot assist in preparation, completion or notarization of any deed unless we are performing escrow as part of a refinance or sale. We cannot assist in completion of excise affidavits used to process the deed.
We do provide accommodation recording services. If you send or bring in completed documents and appropriate county fees, we will run the documents to the courthouse for an accommodation fee.
Answer: This is a good point, and I should have explained this more clearly in my previous columns on filing a quit claim deed.
Title company employees and escrow company employees are not allowed to give legal advice in regard to preparing a quit claim deed. But once the quit claim deed is prepared you can bring it to them to make sure it is recorded properly rather than going to the county recorder’s office to record the deed yourself, which some people do.
So what are your options if you want to do a simple quit claim deed transaction, such as adding your spouse to the title of your home?
You could do it yourself by downloading a blank form from a title company website or other source, but I strongly advise you not to do that. We’ve occasionally had clients at my mortgage company prepare and file their own quit claim deeds.
Sometimes they do it right, but more often they do it wrong, and then they have to record another deed to correct their mistake, which means paying the recording fees all over again and negating the cost savings of doing it themselves.
Ideally, you should hire an attorney to prepare a quit claim deed for you. But that can be relatively expensive if you go to a full service legal firm. Instead, I suggest you find an escrow company that is owned and operated by an attorney.
Escrow officers cannot offer legal advice, but attorneys can provide escrow services and therefore provide legal advice at the same time.
For example, my mortgage company has worked with one such escrow company. The escrow company is owned by an attorney and provides legal services as well as escrow services. They will prepare a quit claim deed to your specifications for a relatively small fee that is typically much less than you would pay at a traditional law firm.
And because they are an escrow service they will also record the deed for you. It costs more than doing it yourself, but you are guaranteed to get it done right the first time and not create property title issues that could cause you problems in the future.
So if you are preparing to do a quit claim deed transaction, do a Google search to find attorney-owned escrow companies your area.
Steve Tytler is a licensed real estate broker and owner of Best Mortgage. You can email him at features@heraldnet.com.
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