Do I need a witness when signing a contract for sale in Queensland?

The REIQ Contract which is the main form of contract for the sale of residential land in Queensland, provides for the sellers and buyers signatures to be witnessed.

There is no strict legal requirement for signatures to be witnessed on a contract for the sale of residential land. Accordingly, your contract will not be void by the fact that a signature has not been witnessed.

The benefit of having your signature witnessed is that it stops parties denying they signed the contract at a later date. In order to avoid that argument down the track, we recommend that you do get your signatures witnessed and ensure the other party has also had their signatures witnessed.

There are no specific qualifications required of a witness signing a REIQ Contract (eg. it does not have to be witnessed by a JP or solicitor). It is however preferable to have signatures witnessed by an independent party.

As of 2022, most contracts are now being executed by a digital signature through such providers as DocuSign. Where a digital signature is used, the benefit identified above is no longer relevant as a contract that has been executed digitally contains an audit trail that can be used as evidence if any dispute around the execution were to arise.