Giving a car away in Louisiana is a formal act, not a favour. The department's rule is short and absolute: an act of donation must be signed in the presence of two witnesses and a notary or it will not be accepted. Not a notary or two witnesses, the way an ordinary sale can be - both. This is the form, and it turns up most often at the end of an estate, when the heirs have established who owns the vehicle and one of them is passing it to another.
Written against DPSMV 1699 (no revision printed), issued under Louisiana Civil Code, donation inter vivos of a corporeal movable.
No revision is printed on this form at all - the footer is a page number. The requirement it exists to satisfy did not come from the form and does not appear on it: the two-witnesses-and-a-notary rule is stated in the department's Policy 2.00, and reading the sheet on its own would leave you thinking one notary was enough.
Two documents, and they are not the same thing. Take the blank DPSMV 1699 from the public.powerdms.com copy so you get the revision that is current today.
This is the actual DPSMV 1699, rendered from the PDF the Louisiana Office of Motor Vehicles publishes and completed end to end: letterhead, every field, and the blocks at the foot.
Amber — you write it
Grey — not yours to fill
Numbered — explained below
The actual act of donation, completed at the end of the estate the heirship affidavit opened. The two witness rules and the donor and donee signature rules carry no fillable boxes - which is the form telling you that everybody signs it together, in ink, in one room.
Field by field
Every line, in the order you meet it
1
You fill this in
Parish of
Top right of the sheet, beside State of Louisiana.
Watch out: Where the act is passed. With four signatures needed in the same place at the same time, this is usually the parish of whichever notary can get everybody around one table.
2
You fill this in
Donor
The rule directly under the sentence that names the notary and the witnesses together.
Watch out: The person giving the car away, named as the certificate of title names them. Where the vehicle came out of an estate, this is the person the heirship affidavit or the judgment of possession established as the owner.
3
The buyer fills this in
Donee
The second full-width rule.
Watch out: The person receiving it, and the printed text has them accepting the donation rather than merely being named in it. They have to sign, and they have to be there.
4
You fill this in
VIN
The last of four boxes on the vehicle row.
Watch out: Seventeen characters off the face of the certificate. The act is a transfer of one specific movable and this is what identifies it.
5
You fill this in
The relationship between Donor and Donee
A single rule under the vehicle row.
Watch out: Write the actual relationship in plain words - mother to daughter, uncle to nephew. It is on the form because a gift between strangers invites the question of what else changed hands, and a blank invites it louder.
6
You fill this in
The value of the movable property donated herein is $
One box in a sentence of its own.
Watch out: Not a price. A donation is not a sale and the value here is not what the donee pays - but it is still the value of the thing given, and it belongs in the act.
7
Somebody else fills this in
Notary ID
The right-hand position on the notary rule at the foot, after Notary Signature and Notary Printed Name.
Watch out: The number is what makes the notarisation acceptable, and this form gives it a labelled position rather than making you find room. An act missing it must be rejected however well the rest of it is done.
At a glance
What goes where
On the form
What to put in it
State of Louisiana, Parish of
The parish the act is passed in.
Before me, the undersigned notary public, duly commissioned and qualified in and for the parish and state aforesaid, and before the undersigned competent witnesses
The appearance clause, and note what it names: a notary AND competent witnesses, in the same sentence, before anybody has written anything.
Donor
A full-width rule, followed by of legal age, who hereby donates and delivers with full and general warranty of title unto.
Donee
The second rule, followed by of legal age, who hereby accepts the within donation. Acceptance is part of the act rather than something that happens later.
Make, Model, Year, VIN
Four boxes describing the movable property.
The relationship between Donor and Donee is as follows
One rule. The department reads it, because a donation between people with no relationship at all is a sale with the price left off.
The value of the movable property donated herein is $
A figure. A donation is not taxed as a sale but the value still goes on the act.
Donor warrants that there are no mortgages, liens, or encumbrances
A printed warranty covering the property and any accessories attached to it.
Signed on this __ day of __, 20 __
Three blanks above the execution block.
Witness Signature/Printed Name, twice
Two rules on the left of the block where the act is executed, facing the donor and donee lines.
Donor Signature/Printed Name, Donee Signature/Printed Name
Two rules down the right.
Notary Signature, Notary Printed Name, Notary ID
One rule across the foot with three labelled positions on it.
What gets this one rejected
•Signed in front of a notary with no witnesses, or in front of two witnesses with no notary. The act needs both and the department says so in terms.
•The donee's acceptance missing. The printed text has the donee accepting the donation, and an act signed only by the donor is an offer.
•The relationship line left blank, on a form that asks for it in its own sentence.
•Value left empty. It is not a sale price but it is still the value of what was given.
•A notary identification number missing from the line that names it.
•A donation used to move a vehicle for money. The document warrants a donation; a price paid makes it something else, and the department processes a multiple transfer when the paperwork tells two stories.
Rules that decide whether it is accepted
•Both witnesses and the notary, every time. This is the one place Louisiana is stricter about a private transfer than it is about an ordinary sale. A sale can be endorsed before a notary or before two witnesses. A donation needs two witnesses and a notary together.
•A donation still needs the title assigning. The act of donation records the gift. The certificate of title still has to be endorsed, and the odometer disclosure still has to be made on a vehicle within twenty model years of the current one.
•The other gift form is not this one. The department publishes a separate memorialisation of a manual gift, and it is restricted to a gift made in connection with a transaction at a dealer licensed by the Louisiana Motor Vehicle Commission. For a gift between two people, this is the form.
Every line here was read off DPSMV 1699 (no revision printed) itself — the PDF is here — and off the Louisiana Office of Motor Vehicles pages.
This is plain-language help with a form, not legal advice, and where our wording and the agency's differ,
theirs governs.
