Rant: Are there no checklists? Have we lost the art of organization?

Today, we closed on a sale of property. The buyers wanted to go fast, so I give the title company and the realtor some slack on this. (OTOH, I want the money, so I didn't protest, so a little my bad, too.)

HOWEVER:

The closing documents are 30-something pages. It's got lots of intricacies, so would not a checklist to make sure that everything I needed to sign and have notarized was enclosed be appropriate? I don't know -- I'm not the expert -- that's what they are paid to do. There is no reason for 6 last minute documents.

But 5 minutes of checking would have saved me hours of chasing notaries and 3 USPS express envelopes (with their high carbon foot-print) and several anxiety attacks. And it would saved me sanity points, because my grandmother (with her short-term memory issues) has been asking several times every day what's going on because she can't remember details, but knows it's happening. (It was her land.) (Also, she really, really wants to go spend some of her money. Fortunately, her idea of spending a lot of money is dropping $500 at Penneys, not $50K. I promised her this weekend, but I may have to break that promise or spend it out of my pocket.)

I know real estate is one of the most stressful experiences out there -- so why make it worse for the client? I truly don't mind dropping money on the USPS, but jeezums frack, there has got to be a better way than stall, stall, stall, run around frantically.