"Who Records Your Act of Sale After Closing in Louisiana? The Notary Who Passed It, on a Clock the Statute Sets"

The notary in Lafayette reads the last page of the act of sale out loud, you sign, the seller signs, the two witnesses sign, and the notary signs last and presses a seal into the paper. A second stack follows, the act of mortgage, which you, the two witnesses and the notary sign, since the seller has no part in your loan. Then the keys come across. The notary has just passed both acts, which is the Louisiana word for a document signed in front of a notary and witnesses. The two signed originals stay behind on the notary's desk, in a folder with the parish's name on the tab, and from that moment a Louisiana statute is counting the days.

In Louisiana, the notary who passed your act of sale and your act of mortgage is responsible for recording both with the recorder for the parish where the home is located. La. R.S. 35:199 gives the notary fifteen days after the act is passed, and for a sale in Orleans Parish the act goes to the clerk as recorder within forty-eight hours. You carry nothing to the courthouse.

I'm Jeff Moran, a mortgage broker in Bluffton, South Carolina, originating since 1996, licensed in fifteen states, including Louisiana, NMLS #483943, through C2 Financial Corporation.

I want to walk you through what happens to those two documents after you leave the table, the same way I would if we were sitting at yours.

Who records the act of sale in Louisiana?

The notary does, and in Louisiana the notary does a good deal more than witness a signature. The Louisiana mortgage page explains the civil-law notary in full. A Louisiana notary prepares the documents that transfer the home and runs the signing itself. Louisiana calls a deed an act of sale, calls land immovable property, and calls the document that pledges your home to the lender an act of mortgage. On a financed purchase you usually sign both before a notary and two witnesses, which makes them authentic acts.

A title company can conduct your closing in Louisiana, and when it does, a commissioned notary on its staff passes the acts. The statute's duty follows that notary.

La. R.S. 35:199 requires notaries to record the acts of sale, exchange, donation and mortgage of immovable property passed before them, together with the resolutions, powers of attorney and other documents annexed to those acts. For a home anywhere in Louisiana outside Orleans Parish, the statute says the notary records the act within fifteen days after it is passed, with the appropriate recorder of the parish or parishes in which the immovable property is situated. A property that straddles a parish line gets recorded in both parishes.

In every parish outside Orleans, the Clerk of Court is also the parish's recorder under La. R.S. 13:751. Your act of sale goes into the parish conveyance records and your act of mortgage goes into the parish mortgage records, so the clerk makes two recordings and you pay two recording charges.

The fifteen-day clock, and the one written direction that pauses it

The statute counts from the day the act is passed. Fifteen days is the latest the law allows, and a notary who records electronically can have your act of sale on file the same afternoon or the next morning.

The statute relieves the notary of the recording duty in one situation. All parties to the instrument have to direct the notary expressly, in writing, to defer or withhold the recording, or to deliver the instruments to one of the parties or to another person. Nobody can hold your act of sale off the public record on their own say-so, and that includes the seller and the title company. It takes a written direction with every party's signature on it, and you are one of those parties.

The statute also carries a penalty. A notary who breaks it is subject to a fine of two hundred dollars for each infraction, together with whatever damages the parties suffer as a result. Your lender's title policy also depends on the act of mortgage being recorded in its place in line, so the title company has its own reason to see both acts recorded promptly.

Orleans Parish runs on a shorter clock

For a home in Orleans Parish, the notary files the act with the custodian of notarial records and records it with the register of conveyances or the recorder of mortgages, or both. For an act of sale, or any other act transferring immovable property in Orleans Parish, the clock is shorter. The statute puts the duty on the notary to have the act registered with the clerk as the recorder for the parish within forty-eight hours after it is passed.

Those three offices, the Recorder of Mortgages, the Register of Conveyances and the Custodian of Notarial Archives, were consolidated into one Land Records Division of the Clerk of Civil District Court, on the fourth floor at 1340 Poydras Street. Orleans also charges a documentary transaction tax, paid when the document is recorded; the New Orleans page covers who pays it on a sale and on a refinance.

The reason the recording date matters to you

Once everyone at the table has signed, the sale is complete between you and the seller, and the recording is what makes your ownership good against everybody else. Louisiana Civil Code article 3338 provides that an instrument transferring an immovable, or establishing a real right in one, has no effect as to a third person until it is recorded in the parish mortgage or conveyance records. A third person, in plain words, is anybody who was not a party to your sale: a later purchaser, a creditor of the seller, anyone who lends against the property after you.

Your lender's act of mortgage lives by the same rule. Its place in line against other claims on the home runs from the recording, which is why the act of sale goes on the record first and the act of mortgage goes on right behind it.

Two more things wait on the recording. The parish assessor's staff review recorded documents to move ownership onto the tax rolls, and the homestead exemption is a separate application you make at the assessor afterward, with a copy of the recorded act of sale in hand. Filing the Louisiana homestead exemption after closing walks through that errand. The seller's old mortgage also stays in the mortgage records until the cancellation is recorded, which happens after the payoff clears and can be days after your closing. The Louisiana refinance page explains that cancelling an old mortgage is its own recording, with its own statutory charge.

How do I confirm my Louisiana act of sale was recorded?

1. Please ask the notary at the table how they record, and when they expect both acts to be on record. The answer tells you which day to start looking.

2. Please ask for the recording information when it comes back. You want the parish, the recording date, and the book and page or instrument number the clerk assigned to the act of sale and to the act of mortgage. The statutory recording charge under La. R.S. 13:844 includes a certified or e-certified copy, so there is a copy coming to you, and it is the one the assessor will ask for.

3. You can look it up yourself in the parish clerk's index. Most parish clerks publish an index of the conveyance and mortgage records, and the Louisiana Clerks' Remote Access Authority runs a statewide portal for participating parishes. Some parishes charge a subscription for online access. In Orleans the clerk's online records are by paid subscription, and research at the Clerk's office is free. You search by your name as it appears on the act.

4. You will want to give the tax records some time. The assessor updates ownership from the recorded documents on the assessor's own schedule, so the seller's name on a tax lookup for a while after closing is normal.

5. You will also want to confirm that the seller's old mortgage was cancelled. It is a separate recording, prepared after the payoff clears, and a title search on a later refinance will look for it.

6. The notary is the first call if something looks off. If the deadline has passed and nothing shows in the index, the notary still has the signed originals, and the law says it is the notary's job to record them. That deadline is fifteen days in most parishes and forty-eight hours for a sale in Orleans Parish.

Mistakes that cost time at this stage

Treating the keys as the finish line. The keys mean you have possession, which your purchase agreement controls, and your ownership goes onto the public record when the notary records the act in the days that follow.

Asking the wrong person. In Louisiana, the notary who passed the act is the one who has to record it. The notary's name and identification number are printed on the act of sale, so you can ask for that person by name, even at a title company closing.

Searching the wrong parish. The act is recorded where the home is, whatever the mailing address says. A home with a Baton Rouge address can be in East Baton Rouge, Ascension or Livingston Parish, and the Baton Rouge page walks through them.

Signing a written direction without reading it. The only thing that lifts the notary's recording duty is a direction signed by every party, and your signature would be one of them. You are allowed to ask what it does and why it is there.

Assuming Louisiana works like the state you came from. Every state puts the recording duty somewhere, and in Louisiana it belongs to the notary who passed the act. If you are coming from Missouri, the Missouri post on deed recording after closing covers that state's process.

An illustration, with the calendar made up

The days below are invented to show the mechanism. They are not anyone's real file.

Say you close on a Tuesday morning on a home in Lafayette Parish. The act of sale and the act of mortgage are both passed before the notary and two witnesses by 10 a.m., and the lender's wire reaches the title company at noon.

Tuesday        Both acts passed. The statute's fifteen days begin.
Wednesday      The notary e-records with the Lafayette Parish Clerk of Court.
               Act of sale first, act of mortgage a minute later.
Thursday       You search the clerk's index by your last name.
               Both acts show with Wednesday's date.
Following week The cancellation of the seller's old mortgage is recorded.
Following month You take the certified copy of the act of sale to the
               Lafayette Parish Assessor and file the homestead exemption.

In that version the notary recorded the day after the acts were passed and used one of the fifteen days, and using all fifteen would still be inside the statute.

Your next step in Louisiana

If you are buying in Louisiana, the useful first step is seeing the numbers for your own scenario. Run your numbers and you will see rates for your scenario, your debt ratio, and closing costs priced for Louisiana rather than a national average, including the parish recording charges. No credit pull, no account, nobody calls you.

If you want a letter behind you, get pre-approved for a Louisiana mortgage and we can look at the whole picture together. No pre-approval from anybody is a loan commitment. Final approval depends on the property, the appraisal and underwriting the complete file.

Nothing here is a loan approval, a denial, a commitment to lend, or legal advice. The statute and the Civil Code say what they say, and how they apply to your particular act of sale is a question for your own Louisiana notary or attorney.

Common questions

Who records the act of sale after closing in Louisiana?

The notary who passed the act. La. R.S. 35:199 requires a Louisiana notary to record the acts of sale and mortgage of immovable property passed before them, with the recorder for the parish where the property is. At a title-company closing, the commissioned notary on the company's staff who conducted the signing holds that duty. You do not take anything to the Clerk of Court yourself.

How long does a Louisiana notary have to record an act of sale?

Fifteen days after the act is passed, for property anywhere in Louisiana outside Orleans Parish, under La. R.S. 35:199. That is the latest the statute allows, and a notary who records electronically can have the act on file well before then. For an act of sale in Orleans Parish, the statute requires the notary to have the act registered with the clerk as recorder within forty-eight hours.

Is the recording deadline different in Orleans Parish?

Yes. For a home in Orleans Parish, the notary files the act with the custodian of notarial records and records it with the register of conveyances or the recorder of mortgages, or both. An act of sale there must be registered with the clerk as recorder within forty-eight hours after it is passed. Those offices are now one Land Records Division of the Clerk of Civil District Court at 1340 Poydras Street in New Orleans.

Can anyone delay recording my Louisiana act of sale?

Only with your signature. La. R.S. 35:199 relieves the notary of the recording duty when all parties to the instrument have expressly directed, in writing, that recording be deferred or withheld, or that the instruments be delivered to a party or another person. No single party, including the seller or the title company, can hold the act off the record alone.

How do I look up my recorded act of sale in Louisiana?

In the conveyance records of the Clerk of Court for the parish where the home is, which, outside Orleans Parish, is also the parish's recorder under La. R.S. 13:751. Most parish clerks publish an online index, the Louisiana Clerks' Remote Access Authority runs a statewide portal for participating parishes, and some charge a subscription for online access. In Orleans Parish the clerk's online records are by subscription and in-person research at the Clerk's office is free. Search by your name as it appears on the act.

Does recording the act of sale give me the Louisiana homestead exemption?

No. Recording moves ownership onto the public record, and the parish assessor's staff use the recorded documents to move your name onto the tax roll. The homestead exemption is a separate application you make at the assessor for the parish where the home is, with a copy of the recorded act of sale and an ID showing the new address. Once granted, it is permanent for as long as the home remains your primary residence and the title does not change. Nobody at the closing table files it for you.