{"id":497,"date":"2012-01-17T16:47:35","date_gmt":"2012-01-17T16:47:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bfvlaw.com\/but-judge-we-never-signed-anything-2\/"},"modified":"2012-01-17T16:47:35","modified_gmt":"2012-01-17T16:47:35","slug":"but-judge-we-never-signed-anything-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bfvlaw.com\/but-judge-we-never-signed-anything-2\/","title":{"rendered":"But Judge, We Never ‘Signed’ Anything"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

A recent Order out of the Northern District of Georgia casts doubt on the notion that a deal is not done until you sign on the dotted line. In White v. Bank of America, John White got a home loan with Bank of America. Mr. White quickly fell behind on his payments and received several default notices from the bank. Mr. White asked to modify his loan and in July 2009, BoA sent Mr. White an offer letter and a proposed Loan Modification Agreement. The offer letter, printed on BoA letterhead and closing with the salutation \u201cTHE HOPE TEAM\u201d, congratulated Mr. White on being approved for modification. To take advantage of his offer, all Mr. White had to do was complete and return the Loan Mod Agreement within 30 days.<\/p>\n

Mr. White signed the Agreement before a notary public and timely returned it. However, the notary who took Mr. White\u2019s signature dated the document in a space intended for her printed name. On receipt, BoA notified Mr. White that it was \u201cunable to process the modification\u201d due to an \u201cIncorrect or Incomplete Notary Signature\u201d. Thereafter, BoA sold Mr. White\u2019s home on the courthouse steps.<\/p>\n

Mr. White sued BoA for breach of contract and wrongful foreclosure. Believing the facts and law squarely on his side, Mr. White asked for a summary judgment in his favor without the necessity of a trial. For its part, BoA asked the Court to dismiss Mr. White\u2019s case, arguing that it never \u201csigned\u201d the offer letter, or \u201ccountersigned\u201d the Agreement. Therefore, no binding contract was formed.<\/p>\n

The trial court found for Mr. White, holding that the offer letter and Agreement to contained all the necessary elements of an enforceable contract. The Judge then cited long standing precedent for the proposition that a contract is \u201csigned\u201d when it is affixed with \u201cany symbol executed or adopted with present intention to adopt or accept a writing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Applying this precedent, the Judge noted that BoA\u2019s name and corporate logo were prominently displayed, along with the salutation, \u201cTHANK YOU FOR YOUR BUSINESS \u2026 The HOPE Team\u201d on the offer letter. The Court concluded that these symbols constituted \u201can authentic writing prepared by\u201d the bank, and effectively constituted BoA\u2019s \u2018signature\u2019 on the offer letter and the accompanying Agreement.<\/p>\n

What can we learn from this? A signature is but one manifestation of an intent to be bound to the terms of a writing. Other indicia can include the use of company letterhead, an email signature block, or even a voicemail. At the end of the day, it\u2019s not so much the signature, but the intent to be bound, coupled with all the elements of an enforceable contract (a blog post for another day), that matters.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A recent Order out of the Northern District of Georgia casts doubt on the notion that a deal is not done until you sign on the dotted line. In White v. Bank of America, John White got a home loan with Bank of America. Mr. White quickly fell behind on his payments and received several […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_mo_disable_npp":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,6,8],"tags":[46,40,18,27,31],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nBut Judge, We Never 'Signed' Anything - Berman Fink Van Horn P.C.<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.bfvlaw.com\/but-judge-we-never-signed-anything-2\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"But Judge, We Never 'Signed' Anything - Berman Fink Van Horn P.C.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"A recent Order out of the Northern District of Georgia casts doubt on the notion that a deal is not done until you sign on the dotted line. 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