Paperwork for a real estate transaction – from listing to closing – can be a real time-drain for all involved. Just sign here, here, here and initial here, here, here and here…and when your fingers are cramping and numb, we’ll have ourselves a legal document.  And with all the signatures and initials, it could necessitate a physical therapy appointment.

DocuSign (www.docusign.com) offers a legal, secure  electronic signature service guaranteed to reduce wear-and-tear on schedules and fine motor skills. DocuSign Lite is a free service anyone can use from DocuSign’s homepage. There’s no paper, no account to set up, no cost or credit card number to provide.

Simply upload the document that requires a signature and enter the email address of the recipient. Your recipient gets an email message from DocuSign notifying them of a document to be signed and you receive an emailed receipt confirming that the process is complete.

An electronic signature is enforceable and legal. (even in California!) There’s a whole section on the DocuSign site dedicated to real estate professionals and how DocuSign can speed up this necessary chore for folks on both sides of a transaction.  For more information, check out the key points from an October 6 talk by Ken Moyle, “Legality of Electronic Signatures and Real Estate” (http://docusign.com/blog/category/realestate/).

So when you hear, “where do I sign?”;  now you can tell your clients,  just click here, here, here and here…