A person who is not an attorney asks a notary public to prepare a quitclaim deed for a real estate transaction. The notary says they cannot do that, but then suggests the person fill out the deed on their own and the notary will 'look it over and correct any errors.' Is the notary's suggested action permitted?

The notary in this scenario correctly identifies the first boundary and then walks straight across it. Preparing a quitclaim deed for someone else is drafting a legal instrument, which a non-attorney may not do — that much the notary got right. But offering to look it over and correct any errors is the same activity in a different sequence. Telling a person what to write in a deed, which box to complete, how to describe the property, or how to hold title is advice about legal rights and consequences, and the fact that the client's hand did the writing changes nothing about who supplied the judgment. The unauthorized practice of law is defined by the nature of the service rather than by who holds the pen or whether a separate fee is charged. What a notary may properly do is notarize the signature on a deed the client prepared or had prepared, and refer the drafting question to an attorney.

Advising on how to prepare a quitclaim deed supplies legal judgment about rights and consequences, which is the unauthorized practice of law regardless of who physically completes the document.

Non-attorney notaries may not draft legal documents or advise on their content, which constitutes the unauthorized practice of law. Notarizing a signature on a document the client prepared is a permitted notarial act.

Whose Judgment, Not Whose Pen. Reviewing and correcting is drafting with extra steps.

Choosing between an acknowledgment and a jurat is a notarial judgment the notary may not make either — the document or the client must specify it.

• •Believing review is distinguishable from drafting
• •Treating a waived fee as curing the issue
• •Refusing to notarize deeds at all