Gift deed

[janal]

A gentleman who fell ill early this year made out a gift deed to his daughter in February. ( property in California )
He passed away in July. She then went to the Director of the Department of Public Works & Planning to carry out the deed.They would not accept the deed because it was not noterized.
Is it too late ( september ) to have the document noterized with an acknowledgment ???
what legal actions need to be taken out to carry out the deed???

 

[dee_dub]

Yes, it is too late to get it notarized. When a person gets something notarized, they sign it in the presence of a notary. The point of notarization is to provide proof that the person actually signed the thing. You can see the problem here. Your deed can never be notarized.

What are the circumstances here? Even if it was accepted, it might be invalid for other reasons, for example if it was made to defraud creditors.

 

[janal]

In the State of California, the signer does not need to be in the presence of a notary when signing.
Was curious on the time frames.
Not sure what the exact circumstances are.
Thank You I appreciate your help.

 

[dee_dub]

You're correct, in some cases a notary could accept proof of execution by a subscribing witness other than the executor. However, this is not available for many types of deeds, including (I suspect) gift deeds.

Also, while I don't think there's any "best before date" on deeds, the subscribing witness would have to have been asked to act as such by the testator. The fact that the deed has been sitting around since February and no-one has sought to get it notarized yet suggests (to me, anyways) that the executor did not ask anyone to act as subscribing witness.