Who Handles Your Closing in Alabama, an Attorney or a Title Company?

If you have bought a house in another state, the Alabama closing can feel like a riddle. In Georgia an attorney has to run the closing. In much of the West, a neutral escrow company does everything and no lawyer appears at all. Alabama sits in between, and the line is drawn by a statute most buyers have never heard of and a 1983 Alabama Supreme Court case that started with two Army lieutenants buying a townhouse in Enterprise.

Here is what the rule actually is, what it means at your closing table in Tuscaloosa, Northport or Birmingham, and the two questions worth asking before you sign anything.

Is Alabama an attorney closing state?

Not in the strict sense. Alabama has no law requiring an attorney to be physically present when you sign. What Alabama has instead is a statutory definition of the practice of law that is unusually specific about title companies.

Ala. Code 34-3-6(b)(2) says that anyone who, for money, “advises or counsels another as to secular law, or draws or procures or assists in the drawing of a paper, document, or instrument affecting or relating to secular rights” is practicing law. Subsection (c) then carves out a narrow lane for the title industry: a company may prepare abstracts of title and may certify, guarantee or insure title, but it is expressly “prohibited from preparing or drawing or procuring or assisting in the drawing or preparation of deeds, conveyances, mortgages” and similar documents, unless the company has a proprietary interest in the property. The only documents it may draft are simple affidavits for its own files that are never recorded.

So the functional rule in Alabama is not “an attorney must be there.” It is an attorney must have prepared the legal documents, and an attorney is the only one who can answer legal questions about them.

What happened in the case that set the rule?

The leading decision is Coffee County Abstract and Title Co. v. State ex rel. Norwood, 445 So. 2d 852 (Ala. 1983). The facts are worth knowing because they are so ordinary.

In June 1980, two single Army lieutenants stationed at Fort Rucker bought a townhouse together in Enterprise as a residence and an investment. The title company employee conducted the closing. During the closing, one buyer asked whether title was passing in a way that, if either of them died, his heirs would inherit his share. The closer said yes. The deed actually passed title as joint tenants with right of survivorship, which means the opposite: the survivor would take the whole thing, and the deceased buyer’s heirs would get nothing. A local lawyer happened to see the deed at the courthouse, thought it odd, and called them.

The Alabama Supreme Court held that the title company had engaged in the unauthorized practice of law on two grounds: it filled in the blanks on the deed, which the court said is indistinguishable from drafting it, and its employee gave a legal opinion about the effect of how title was taken. The court pointed out that filling in a form requires deciding which form to use in the first place.

There is a detail people miss. On rehearing, the court narrowed its order. The final injunction does not ban the company from conducting closings. It bans it from conducting closings “at which officers or employees … give legal advice or express opinions as to the effect of legal documents.” Chief Justice Torbert wrote separately to make the point explicit: if a legal question comes up at the table, the closer should stop the proceeding and tell the parties to consult their attorneys.

So what can a title company legally do at my closing?

Working from the statute and the case, the safe list looks like this:

What it cannot do is draft the deed, the mortgage or any other instrument affecting your rights, and it cannot tell you what those documents mean. In practice, that is why nearly every Alabama residential closing has an attorney’s name on the deed as preparer, even when the closing itself is run by a title or settlement company.

Does the seller get to pick the closing company?

Not when it comes to your title insurance. Section 9 of the federal Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act, at 12 U.S.C. 2608, says that no seller of a property being bought with a federally related mortgage loan may require, directly or indirectly, as a condition of selling, that the buyer purchase title insurance from any particular title company. A seller who does it is liable to the buyer for three times all charges made for that title insurance.

That matters more than it sounds. Around Tuscaloosa, Northport and the Birmingham suburbs, a listing or a builder will often have a preferred closing attorney, and there is frequently nothing wrong with using them. But “preferred” and “required” are different words, and the difference is a federal statute. If you would rather use your own attorney, say so during negotiation rather than the week of closing, because the preparer of the deed affects the timeline. Our full walkthrough of what title insurance actually covers in Alabama goes deeper on the owner’s policy versus the lender’s policy.

What should I actually ask before closing day?

Three questions cover most of it.

A local perspective from The Williams Group

The Williams Group at Keller Williams Realty works both the West Alabama and Greater Birmingham sides of this, and the closing table looks a little different in each. In Tuscaloosa and Northport, a large share of closings are handled by a handful of long-established local firms, and the deed preparer is usually the same attorney running the room. In the Birmingham suburbs, it is more common to see a settlement or title company conducting the closing with an attorney’s name on the instruments. Both are legal. Both are normal. Neither one gets you out of reading the deed.

Two patterns we see repeatedly are worth flagging. The first is out-of-state buyers relocating for a job at Mercedes, DCH, UAB or the University of Alabama who assume Alabama works like the state they left, and who are surprised that the closer will not answer a question about survivorship. That is not the closer being unhelpful. That is the closer following Coffee County. The second is unmarried co-buyers, including parents buying near campus with an adult child, or two friends splitting a first house. That is precisely the fact pattern in the 1983 case, and it is the one where getting the deed wrong is most expensive.

Frequently asked questions

This article is general information about Alabama law and is not legal advice. Statutes and case law change, and how they apply depends on your specific facts. Talk to a licensed Alabama attorney about your transaction.

Sources

Ala. Code 34-3-6, Who May Practice as Attorneys
Coffee County Abstract and Title Co. v. State ex rel. Norwood, 445 So. 2d 852 (Ala. 1983)
Land Title Co. of Alabama v. State ex rel. Porter, 299 So. 2d 289 (Ala. 1974)
12 U.S.C. 2608, RESPA Section 9, Title companies; liability of seller

Last updated: September 2026.