e-Closing Spans San Antonio Airport and Stewart Title Office in The Woodlands, Texas
July 17, 2006
HOUSTON-- A sflight delay due to weather added an interesting wrinkle to an electronic closing scheduled in Montgomery County, Texas, utilizing Stewart Title's patent-pending eClosingRoom(TM) electronic closing platform and the SureClose(R) online transaction management system.
With an online home search and purchase process utilizing HAR.com, Reveal Systems and SureClose, the buyers were set to go online from home the night before their scheduled e-closing and review all their documents. They would then go online in eClosingRoom and "click-to-sign" their documents - leaving only the signature captures for the e-closing the next morning.
Instead, with bad weather holding up the husband's business flight out of San Antonio, he borrowed a tablet PC from another stranded traveler, logged on to his password protected SureClose portal, viewed each of his closing documents, proceeded to "click-to-sign" each document and then used the signature capture feature to pre-sign the 14 documents in the airport waiting area. At home, the wife viewed the documents and clicked-to-sign. She then executed her signature the next morning at the Stewart Title of Montgomery County office in The Woodlands.
Kayelin Wright, a sales associate with Coldwell Banker United, Realtors(R), was the real estate agent representing the buyers. She said the decision to offer paperless real estate services was a simple matter of offering a better home purchase and selling experience for her customers.
As a member of the Houston Association of Realtors(R) (HAR) and HAR.com MLS, Wright receives electronic notifications when properties with specific features desired by her buyer prospects are available for purchase. For this particular purchase, Wright was notified electronically that this home had come onto the market within 15 minutes of the listing being submitted.
Wright also utilized Reveal Systems TrueForms(TM) online documents to electronically prepare the purchase and sale agreement and submit to the property sellers, who were moving to Michigan the weekend the purchase offer was made.
"Through HAR.com's online home listing and search features, I have immediate access to new listing information allowing me to quickly find the right home for my customers," she said. "And with the SureClose transaction management system, I can manage the entire real estate process online. In fact, all my communication with the listing agent was handled electronically - it was very efficient.
"Stewart Title provides electronic signing and closing solutions to speed up the closing process and enhance the closing experience for our customers," said Darren Ross, Stewart Transaction Solutions director of eCommerce. "Because Stewart Title has taken a leading role in automating the real estate transaction process, various county governments, recorders and mortgage lenders are gearing up to become a part of the paperless process by accepting electronically signed mortgage and real estate documents."
Source: Stewart Information Services Corp.
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