AnalysisAssembly Bill 2326 expands the journal thumbprint requirement to include and prohibits the performance of proofs of execution by subscribing witness on any document affecting real property. Enactment of this legislation is a positive development for those, like the NNA, who are proponents of journal thumbprints and limiting proofs of execution. However, the legislation will be very difficult for Notaries to comply with because a “document affecting real property” is very broad. Currently, California Notaries know that journal thumbprints are required for all powers of attorney, deeds, quitclaim deeds, and deeds of trust affecting real property and that they cannot perform a proof on powers of attorney, grant deeds, mortgages, deeds of trust, quitclaim deeds and security agreements. Documents requiring journal thumbprints and prohibited for proofs are either specified by name or document type. As an example of just how broad this new provision is and how difficult it will be to implement, consider: If an individual executes a living trust and the trust instrument places property into the trust, the signer of the trust would have to place his or her right thumbprint in the Notary’s journal and the document could not be proved by a subscribing witness. Looking at the title of the instrument (in this case a living trust) would not adequately inform a Notary that a thumbprint is required or that it is a document for which a proof of execution may not be performed. The Notary would have to read the document to see if it affects real property or ask the signer if it does so. To help with this problem, the NNA is compiling a list of documents affecting real property that it knows will require a journal thumbprint, but by nature any such list will be incomplete.
Read Assembly Bill 2326.