- What is HMLR
- The digital era of HMLR
- What is HMLR's current update on electronic signatures?
- Zoho Sign: The best tool for HMLR document signing
- Benefits of choosing Zoho Sign
- FAQs
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In a landmark revision, HM Land Registry (HMLR) has updated its guidelines (as of 24 February 2025) to accept electronically signed paperwork. This includes all paperwork that fall under the purview of HMLR, such as mortgage agreements, lease contracts, warranty deeds, transfer deeds, and other dispositionary deeds. Conveyancers and proprietors can now sign paperwork securely from anywhere at anytime with the ease of digital signature providers like Zoho Sign.
What is HMLR?
His Majesty's Land Registry (HMLR) is a non-ministerial department in the United Kingdom where lands owned in England and Wales are registered. With a history of 160 years of diligent record-keeping, almost 90% of the land in England and Wales are registered formally under HMLR.
The digital era of HMLR
Opening up to digitizing paperwork is an excellent step by HMLR to ensure safe and swift handling of documentation. Especially with the increasing growth of hybrid organization, globally positioned businesses, and remote work, HMLR's current decision to accept electronically signed and witnessed contracts is welcomed with open hands, because it makes paperwork error-free, traceable, easily retrievable, trackable, and most importantly, secure from all forms of tampering.
What is HMLR's current update on electronic signatures?
Practice guide 82: electronic signatures accepted by HM Land Registry elucidates how documents to be registered with HMLR must be digitized and electronically signed. The guides also contain details of their earlier practices, which denote step-by-step instructions that organizations and proprietors can follow for seamless electronic signing of HMLR-related contracts.
In short, HMLR has agreed to accepting electronic signatures and online witnesses for certain agreements as long as they meet a set of requirements. Learn more about the deeds and requirements in Practice guide 8: execution of deeds.
Zoho Sign: The best tool for HMLR document signing
HMLR mandates some requirements for the various types of deeds and contracts that are registered under them. Here's how Zoho Sign can help you meet all of those requirements with no additional effort.
HMLR requirement
Zoho Sign's solution
Electronic signatures
Type, draw, or upload electronic signatures.
Qualified electronic signatures (QES)
Sign QES via qualified trust service providers like InfoCert and Uanataca.
Electronic witness signing
Add up to two witnesses per recipient and allow recipients to edit witness details.
Name, email ID, phone number of the signer and witnesses
Collect recipient and witness details while building workflows.
Fields must highlight in correspondence to who must sign them (signer or witness)
Customize the recipient experience by setting automatic navigation through fields corresponding to the particular signer or witness.
Email must be the mode of delivery of documents to signatories
Supports document delivery via email.
OTP (minimum of six digits) must be sent for signer verification
Supports OTP with six digits as a mode of recipient authentication.
Sign date and time must be recorded
Sign date field, visible signatures, and blockchain-based timestamping can be used to capture the authentic date and time of signing.
Audit trail must be available
A certificate of completion is downloadable for free, and reports can be checked to track documents.
A PDF of the completed deed must be available
Signed documents can be downloaded as PDFs.
Benefits of choosing Zoho Sign
Global legal compliance
Zoho Sign adheres to international data privacy and security guidelines like the GDPR, CCPA, and HIPAA. Zoho Sign is court-admissible in most nations and regions across the world because it is compliant with the eIDAS, ITA-2000, ETA, and similar electronic signature laws.
Recipient authentication
Signers can authenticate their identity via multiple modes in Zoho Sign. Zoho Sign integrates with Signicat to provide EU eID-based signer verification.
Compatible across devices
Zoho Sign's native apps work seamlessly across devices. Whether it is your Apple ecosystem, your Windows desktop, or your Android mobile, Zoho Sign helps you sign with ease, anytime, anywhere.
Highly secure signatures
All documents signed with Zoho Sign are protected by AES-256 based encryption at rest and follow the TSL/SSL protocol in transit. To ensure no external tampering, Zoho Sign offers advanced and qualified electronic signatures (AES and QES) in integration with qualified trust service providers (QTSPs).
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FAQs
His Majesty's Land Registry (HMLR) is a non-ministerial department that has been registering land and property details in the United Kingdom for more than 160 years. As of 2025, around 90% of all land in the UK has been registered with HMLR. Registering under HMLR ensures rightful ownership, inheritance, conveyance, and demarcation of land to all owners, proprietors, conveyancers, lease-holders, tenants, and associated parties.
Yes. HMLR now accepts e-signed documents as long as they comply with the requirements set by them. You can find the requirements here.
Zoho Sign helps you meet all of HMLR's requirements to e-sign documents. You can record your electronic signature, sign using QES, add witnesses to sign electronically, set automatic navigation through fields, enforce OTP-based signer authentication, collect signer metadata, and download tamper-free audit trails, too.
You can send an email to support@zohosign.com with any questions or for technical assistance. Our team will assist you as soon as possible.
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