Shannon - Any document that is filed in a courthouse is considered a legal document - at least in my state.  You can represent yourself in court and even prepare legal documents for yourself but you cannot prepare them for others unless you are an attorney - to do otherwise is practicing law.  I 'm thinking some are getting around this in some way or another - maybe the lenders supply their form and ask you to fill the mortgage information in the form etc. - I don't know - I wondered this myself and actually is that what the VMs are doing from us doing the mort/assignment reports - I am assuming the are releasing prior owner D/Ts from what I can see from my research.  I have often wondered if I provide them with the information and they give it back to the lender or they themselves prepare these documents and file them, etc.  - could be why Texas documentation is such a mess.  I talked to one mort/assignment release company and told them that I noticed return to their company and that the releases and/or assignments are not being prepared where we will be able to find them in our state - they are leaving out the legal description (the way they are indexed in Texas) and just saying as described therein which further gets back to my point of knowing the state and the state's laws before you can adequately research anything.

Anyone else know anything else ?

Lisa