With the refinance of a home in Winston Salem, N.C, the Tar Heel State recently executed its first fully electronic mortgage closing.
The eClosing was conducted by North State Bank for homeowners Jason and Karen Boccardi.
“This was our first North Carolina eClosing,” Secretary of State Elaine F. Marshall said in a release. “It is not our last. We want this to become a regular option for lenders and their customers because of the many advantages eClosing offers versus the slower, traditional paper-based system.”
North Carolina has taken several steps to modernize the mortgage process, including conducting an increasing amount of paper-free electronic recordings of government-required filings and land records.
The state also has developed the standards and curriculum for eNotary which allows a notary public to attach a digital version of their notary stamp to electronic legal transactions.
“The eNotary is essential to moving legal filings into the digital age,” Marshall said. “People and institutions still want to know that a notary was there in the room confirming the signer’s identity even if the filing is moving through cyberspace instead of being a pile of paper.”
The eMortgage was insured by Investors Title Insurance Co. of Chapel Hill. DocMagic and World Wide Notary were the electronic solution providers.
“We stand ready to work with all other North Carolina lenders to get them up to speed on this,” Marshall said. “One thing we all noted during this closing was that even though we tried to make it into a real ceremony — it was still so fast and easy that we had a hard time not being finished in just a few moments.”