Signing companies are getting at minimum $125 to $150 for clients with some amount of volume. Infrequent clients of signing companies get $200 to $300.
A NSA deserves no less than $100 for a 150 page signing within 20 miles and no faxbacks. That should be your basis and adjust from there.
Their job, like yours is negotiate a fair fee, but some signing companies want it all. I have seen some companies getting $200 and want to pay an NSA $65. Not a fair transaction
You need to know your market and what the companies will settle for. Signing services are not going to offer what direct customers will offer. You need to know your costs and what amount will allow you to make a profit. Know what your costs per page to print are and know what your costs per mile will be. You need to profit on these items, not just break even. I look for a 100 per cent profit over cost on printing and travel. The remaining question is how much you will accept for your appointment, which is basically what you charge for your time and effort. I try to keep a running average, so that the ones over what I will settle for might make up for the ones less than I will settle for. It might make sense to take a lower paying job if you have nothing else that day and it will not affect your average return on signings. If you are offered 5 ninety dollar closings and 1 hundred dollar closing and accept only the hundred dollar closing, you are bringing in one hundred dollars, instead of five hundred fifty dollars. Negotiate every closing fee and use sense doing it.
I’ve seen forms that have to be signed in the packages with the notary fee the customer is paying and it’s much more than what I’m getting.
My base fee is $100 normal set of edocs under 125 pages. (No less than $75 no print signing) Any packages larger pay a little more for printing and time. I figure for a local closing we have around 3 hours in a regular refinance that includes accepting order time, checking emails, communicating with customer and borrower, driving, signing, dropping docs ( now that they provide labels and we have to go to a shipping location instead of them picking up at my office) then there’s the billing time. And many want the faxback/scanned which means you have to go back to your office, scan/email/fax docs then go back out to a shipping location. How much time does that take? Guys unless you want to make less than you would as a cashier at the local grocery store you need to be competitive and STOP taking those low ball offers It hurts everyone in the industry. We have to have good running cars, office equipment and supplies ect. All this cost money and you then need to actually ‘take home’ some $$$ too! Portland Oregon has a new influx of notaries that are taking the $40-$65 low ball fees and killing our market. You actually lose money with those fees…
