House sale - witnessing of contract signature

Property & Home
1

My brothers and I inherited my parents old second home in France.


It took years (literally!) for us to get the house transferred into our names and we signed a pre-contract for the sale in October. It is due to complete on 1st December. Despite asking and asking the notaire to send us any documents we have only just received the documents for signing.


We have now received the next document from the notaires office and been told we need to get the signature checked by a mairie. We now reach the obvious stumbling block of not having a mairie close by in England / not knowing if we will be able to get an appointment with one of the nearby people who charge a fortune to witness the signature.


The French notaire we are using has proof of our IDs and also has previous signatures. Do you know if they can accept a signed document and use the previous document as proof? or think of someway round this.

Thanks - we really want the house sale to go through for 1st December but not sure if our timing is now too tight / don't really want us to spend £100 plus per person (and there are 3 of us) to get them signed.

2

Yes apparently we need the notary to check the ID / signature and it must be signed in front of them. I just find it a bit annoying that we have proven our ID and signature in France previously with the notaire for the succession but we have to get someone to do it again.

3

Both Martha and Cyndy have said it. My wife is a part-time agent but away at present for three weeks, she has two 'compromis de vente' going through at present with both vendors outside of France and buyers also. The notaires were informed well in advance, everything set up to make it possible and should there be a need I can put my hand on a couple of sealed envelopes to take to them.

4

I did my entire house purchase transaction in France with the Notaire signing for me using a Power of Attorney.

5

Hi, Becky,

You can have the signature (yours, is it?) approved by any notary in the UK. The purpose is simply to check your ID against your signature and stamp that they have seen that.

You can also sign a procuration which gives the notaire in France the power to sign a specific document for you.

Good luck!