Refinance signings for title companies and lenders

What makes a refinance file different

There is normally no deed and no seller. The borrowers sign a new note and a new mortgage, the new loan pays off the old one, and the package carries the usual Closing Disclosure and affidavits. For many refinances of a borrower's primary residence, federal lending rules give the borrower a short window to cancel after signing, so the package includes a notice of the right to cancel and the lender does not fund until that window has passed.

That notice states the date the period ends. If the signing happens on a different day than the one the documents were drawn for, the dates on the notice may no longer be right. Our notaries do not rewrite those dates on their own judgment: they call your closer from the table and follow the lender's instruction, whether that is to hand-correct and initial, to wait for redrawn pages, or to reschedule.

What your order should tell us

• Every borrower's name exactly as it appears on the note, and every other person the lender says must sign or receive a copy of the notice of the right to cancel (a non-borrowing owner or spouse, for example). Who is entitled to the notice is the lender's and your decision, not the notary's.
• The meeting address and time window, and whether the borrowers will be together or need two appointments.
• The package: upload it to the order, or send the e-docs link. Say whether it prints letter or legal and whether any pages are two-sided.
• How the dates are handled: printed, left blank for the signing date, or hand-entered on the rescission notice.
• The scanback deadline and what to scan (the full package or the signature pages only), and how the originals come back.

At the table

• Each signer's government photo ID is checked against the name on the documents before anything is signed.
• Each document is presented for signature, initials and date where marked; the mortgage and any affidavits that need a notary are notarized, and each notarial act goes in the notary's journal.
• Each person named on the notice of the right to cancel signs the acknowledgment and is left the copies your package provides.
• Before leaving, the notary goes page by page through the set for missed initials, dates and signatures.

What the notary won't do

• Explain the rate, the APR, the cash-out amount, the payoff or whether refinancing makes sense.
• Tell a borrower whether or how to cancel. Questions about the right to cancel go to the lender, and the notary can help the borrower reach your closer during the appointment.
• Change a date, a figure or a name without your instruction.

Scanbacks and the rescission clock

Because funding waits for the cancellation window, the useful time to find a missing initial is the day of the signing. Set the scanback deadline on the order; the notary uploads the signed pages from a phone and your team gets one email with a link to the order. If your reviewer flags a page, tell the desk on the order: the earlier the flag, the more room there is to arrange a re-sign before the window ends. Originals go back on your prepaid label, or we ship and bill the postage at cost, and the tracking number shows on the order.

Pricing basis

• New Jersey loan signings start at $150, with printing and scanbacks included. Starting rates. Your exact price is quoted after we confirm a local notary/runner, before you pay. Accounts with an agreed price pay that price.
• The notarial fee is capped by New Jersey ($25 for a financing) and listed on its own invoice line, separate from the signing service.
• Accounts with steady volume can agree a flat price per order type; that price is set when you open the account, in writing, and then shows on every order in the portal.
• There are no fixed rush, after-hours, weekend or extra-signer surcharges. When a job carries one of those costs, it is itemized on the quote before the order is confirmed (fees page).
• Outside New Jersey, each file is quoted first and placed with a notary commissioned in the signer's state (loan signings in other states).

Coverage

In New Jersey we cover all 21 counties directly from Cranford in Union County. Elsewhere in the U.S. we work through a network of independent notaries commissioned in the signer's state: we confirm coverage before accepting, and an order outside New Jersey is confirmed only once a notary there accepts it. If a time or place can't be covered, we say so instead of taking the order.

Questions

More for closing offices

• Purchase signings (buyer)
• Seller package signings
• HELOC signings
• Reverse mortgage signings
• Hybrid e-closings
• Witness-only and attorney-run closings
• Vendor compliance answers
• Title companies and lenders: start here
• Signing services and rate card
• The closing package

For your borrowers: What the borrower should know about a refinance and the right to cancel.

General information about how our desk works, not legal advice. The lender, underwriter and recording office decide what they accept. Updated November 2026.