Greg Stilianou Legal | Legal

Greg Stilianou Legal

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20.01.2022 COVID-19 has presented challenges which have impacted on presenting paper land dealings at the land titles office. I recently wrote an article for Thomson Reuters about the recent updates to electronically lodging paper documents with the New South Wales land titles office. Here's a link to the article.... https://insight.thomsonreuters.com.au//property-law-nsw-up

17.01.2022 Hello everyone, With social distancing upon us and an impending lock down on the horizon, things that we would normally do face-to-face have to change. Even routine things like signing, witnessing and attesting documents like land contracts, wills, powers of attorney and statutory declarations, will all need to be done differently. We have been closely following the NSW Parliament and the emergency laws that have been passed. For the purposes of responding to the public hea...lth emergency caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, we will soon have new, temporary rules to follow so that we can continue to sign, witness and attest documents, whilst observing social distancing. Parliament’s powers to make these rules commenced on 25 March 2020, and we are awaiting the rules to be created. We will keep you abreast of the new protocols when they are enacted. If you are thinking about preparing or revising your will for peace of mind, or contemplating dealing with your land in some way, get in touch with me, because it is business as usual. You can email me directly at [email protected] or visit http://gslegal.sydney/services/ for a complete list of services. In the meantime, keep safe, stay informed and ensure you and your loved ones are at the forefront of your mind.

17.01.2022 We’ve all been stuck at home for the last 4 weeks. We’ve cleaned and rearranged the home, and if you’re looking for other tasks to complete, it’s the perfect time to think about your family and the future ... Have you thought about doing your will? What about a power of attorney or appointment of enduring guardian to ensure you and your family have peace of mind? A Will is your list of instructions to your executor about what happen to your assets after you pass away. It’s im...portant to have a will because it makes it easy for your family to know what your final wishes are, and this helps reduce the likelihood of disputes. Having a will also means that your wishes decide who gets your property, and not the State's laws. We can design your will to appoint your executor, distribute your property, specify guardians for your children and pets, forgive debts, include any post death requirements like burial or cremation, and more. Having a professionally drafted will means it will be prepared and signed so as to be valid under the laws of the State. In my last post I mentioned we’ve been keeping an eye on the emergency laws passing though Parliament about how to sign Wills and other docs during the COVID-19 lockdown. At this stage, no new laws have been passed. For our appointments, we use Zoom web conferencing to discuss your estate planning needs, and when it comes time to signing your will, rest assured we observe social distancing practices, with sanitising of pens and wearing face masks. But if you’re not comfortable with this, we can always provide you with detailed instructions about how to validly sign your will, so its effective under the law. Get in touch - we look forward to hearing from you.

09.01.2022 Thomson Reuters recently asked me to give my thoughts on managing risk in electronic land transactions. Here's a link to the article: https://insight.thomsonreuters.com.au//managing-risk-in-el

05.01.2022 It is now possible to sign and witness important legal documents like wills, powers of attorney and statutory declarations using online audio-visual technology. Amendments were made to the Electronic Transactions Regulation 2017 on Wednesday 22 April 2020 which enable web conferencing applications such as Zoom, WebEx, Skype, WhatsApp, FaceTime and Microsoft Teams to be used in the witnessing of documents. A key feature of the laws is that the person witnessing the signature... must observe the person sign the document in real time, as opposed to a pre-recorded video of someone signing a document. The witness will then sign the document, or a copy of the document, to confirm they witnessed the signature. This could be done on, either, the signatories signed document that is scanned and sent to the witness, or on an identical counterpart of the document. The witness must endorse the document with a statement which specifies which of the two methods was used, and that it was witnessed in accordance with the Regulation. These are temporary laws whilst we are required to social distance. Traditional methods of signing and witnessing documents remain valid while the regulation is in force. Please post a comment if you have any questions.