Notaries

[Bruxinha]

Just to let you all know that Silves Notary is now private and has moved to Edificio Arade (underneath the apartments before Lidl). I went there today to collect some "simple" copies of 6 deeds for a friend. She wanted sensibly to check out the history of a property she has an interest in buying. However, as she didn't know the date the current owner signed the deed on for this particular property and there were 6 deeds listed on the card for his name, she decided for the price of only 1,50 Euro a copy (the price 2 weeks ago when I was last at the old Notary) to get all 6. Unfortunately, times are a changing. You can't get "simple" copies any more I was told, only fully authenticated ones at a cost of 20 Euros each. Ok, can I have a look at them first and check which one she actually wants I asked. Yes you can, I was told, but for a cost of 11 Euros (not sure if that was each or for all of them). Yikes! Whilst there is still technically freedom of information, it obviously makes finding out things a lot more expensive and possibly prohibitive for some less affluent folks. Let's hope the service warrants it. I assume the other Notaries will follow suit if they already haven't.