If a person is declared incompetent at the time the agreement was signed and notarized, the agreement could be declared ______ and ______.

• A. null and void
• B. void and invalid
• C. null and invalid
• D. void and void

Answer: (A)

When someone is declared incompetent at the moment of signing, there is no true offer and acceptance forming a binding contract—the party lacks the mental capacity to contract. Because the agreement never becomes enforceable from the outset, the instrument is described as null and void. Notarization only verifies who signed and when, not the signer’s capacity, so it cannot cure the lack of competence. The other pairings are awkward or redundant and do not express the idea as precisely as “null and void.”