Online Document Signing Services

[Katarina Takahashi]

I'm a first time landlord and I am about to sign my first lease!

Do you have any recommended online services that you used for signing various documents (ex. Deposit to Hold Agreement, Lease, any addendums)? Are they free or worth paying for?

I'd greatly appreciate any advice.

[Stuart Udis]

I use docusign but any e-sign program that "stamps" each page of the document with an envelope ID is a recommended way to execute documents, particularly contracts. This is because most people prepare contracts with signature blocks at the very end without signatures elsewhere within the document. This could theoretically lead to one of the parties to the contract swapping out the original terms in the body of the contract with alternative terms and while this is fraudulent, untangling this can get messy. You also run the risk of one of the signers claiming they never saw the entire document before signing. Therefore, having an envelope ID on each page protects against these events from happening.