What do mortgage deeds look like?

[50andOut]

Hi all

I have recently paid off my remaining mortgage and have received a pack from the mortgage provider advising The release of mortgage deeds to me.

However the pack they gave me is about 2 inches thick and contains so much legal related stuff from the purchase and even includes information from when the house was first built and when the prior owners bought it, plus our mortgage info. I cannot actually seem to find an official property deed or land registry document in my name

I thought I would just receive a 1 pager certificate similar to a company share certificate.

I am after going through this pack several times, i cannot identify any one thing that sticks out to be an actual deed.

Had a google search and read “the deeds don't look like anything they are a bundle of documents which contain any number of various documents”

Is that accurate? Seems a bit haphazard to me if so?

Appreciate any guidance or confirmation of what I should ensure is included..

Cheers
50

 

[mf1]

The simplest thing to do is to ask your/a solicitor to review what you have been given- your Title Deeds.
The solicitor can review them, 'schedule' them ( as in put them in the appropriate order - Title first, then Planning and Compliance etc.,etc)
They can advise on steps, if applicable, to have the Deeds sale ready- even if you don't intend to sell, it is good to know that all is in order.

Depending on the nature of your Title ( registered in Tailte Eireann ( Land Registry) or an unregistered title) Title Deeds can be anything from the 2inch thick bundle you have to a small A4 bundle.

mf

 

[Peanuts20]

Got mine back from Ulster Bank last year and it was a lot of paper. Never gone through it, just gave it over to the solicitor to "file away" but I presume it is the "history" of the house

 

[Monbretia]

Yes, mine are literally a 2 or maybe even 3 inch thick bundle of documents.

 

[ClubMan]

Same here. 37 different documents, some of them quite large, and only one of which is the folio. The whole bundle c. 3 cm thick in all. Property built in 1995 but some of the documents relate back to stuff in the 19th century due to the nature of the land. My solicitor advised me to keep them all as they would all be relevant to any eventual sale of the property.

 

[Monbretia]

Actually most of them must be like that, when mine arrived by registered post I had missed the postman and he stuck a note in to collect package from post office, as I was I thought expecting nothing I was puzzled by the registered package so I knew I had just missed the post man and what estate he was going to next so I drove up there and found him. He pulled out the package for me and as I pondered on what it could be while looking at it the postman said that in his experience that looked to him like it was coming from a bank! Then the penny dropped, he said he'd been doing the job a long time and he recognised a package of deeds when he saw them!

 

[BIG-notorious]

It depends when you took out your mortgage in the first place.

• 20 years ago and more every lender had their own mortgage deed which generally ran to several pages (could be A3 size folded over or could be several similar to magazine) and was usually green-ish heavy paper. It would have been started with something like "THIS INDENTURE made the ___ day of _________ in the year ___________ between ____________ of the first part (hereinafter called the mortgagor) and Lender ABC of the second part (hereinfater called the mortgagee)......"
• Since at least 2016 the mortgage deed is far simpler, IIRC it's a one page standard Land Registry form in heavy white cardboard.

However the pack they gave me is about 2 inches thick and contains so much legal related stuff from the purchase and even includes information from when the house was first built and when the prior owners bought it, plus our mortgage info. I cannot actually seem to find an official property deed or land registry document in my name

It sounds like your property may not actually be registered which (depending on where it's located) is quite common. Any property being conveyed now must be registered as part of the conveyance but that's only since 2013 or so and you presumably took out your mortgage before then. A simple and easy way to find out is to go to LandDirect.ie, find your home on the map and click on it. If it's registered it'll give you the folio number, if not it'll tell you it's not registered. You can get a copy of the folio for €5 and a certified copy folio & file plan for €40.

Either way you'll need to lodge the discharge/vacate of the mortgage so any search against the property shows it as being clear of that particular encumbrance. It's not a complex process which you can easily do yourself but you may prefer to hand it over to your solicitor to avoid the hassle.

I am after going through this pack several times, i cannot identify any one thing that sticks out to be an actual deed.

Again, depends on the age of the property, leasehold or freehold, and whether it's registered. If it's an older unregistered leasehold property (still quite common but becoming less so due to the requirement to register on conveyances) it could easily have original title deeds going back over a century with the original lease for X term and all subsequent assignments.

To be honest, unless you're going to go work in a solicitors office for a few months to get a practical grounding in conveyancing then you're essentially going to have to take it on faith that the title deeds are as they should be. Mostly faith in the solicitor's undertaking to the lender when you took out the mortgage in the first place which obliged them to register first legal charge on good title as a condition of the release of the loan cheque.

The simplest thing to do is to ask your/a solicitor to review what you have been given- your Title Deeds.
The solicitor can review them, 'schedule' them ( as in put them in the appropriate order - Title first, then Planning and Compliance etc.,etc)
They can advise on steps, if applicable, to have the Deeds sale ready- even if you don't intend to sell, it is good to know that all is in order.

I wouldn't bother unless they're actually contemplating a sale in next 6-12 months. It won't come for free and there's no real value to it. Also the OP already paid a solicitor to make sure everything is in order when they bought the property in the first place.

 

[ClubMan]

Mine was purchased in 1995 but is registered and has a folio - a few pages of A4. But that alone wouldn't be sufficient to sell without additional hassle. The additional planning and related legal documents are also important. My solicitor advised recently to keep the whole bundle together in case they are ever needed for a sale.

 

[50andOut]

Thanks all, good to know this is standard which is what I was hoping to get alignment on and thanks to Big Notorious for that detailed info.

I’ll check land direct. -It was 2008 we took ours and the house was built in 1995, there’s info of the local council handing the land over to the builders etc and then the sale of the house to the previous owners, including copies of their marriage certificate…I thought I had just been used as a bin by the bank….

I thought the same about not needing to engage a solicitors, as why should I have to pay someone now to check it’s all in order when I expected that was done upon purchase..

Cheers
50&Out

 

[BIG-notorious]

there’s info of the local council handing the land over to the builders

If it was owned by a local authority at some point then it's almost certain registered land, as Local Authorities were required to register their properties on purchase for a very long time.

and then the sale of the house to the previous owners, including copies of their marriage certificate…I thought I had just been used as a bin by the bank….

Entirely possible.

People are afraid to remove anything from the title deeds even when they're clearly useless. Going back a long time I had the job of preparing title deeds for return to the lender. It was entirely normal for there to be an original document together with 3 or 4 photocopies of that document kept with the title deeds, as well as multiple copies of the folio & file plan. And to my eternal bewilderment it was totally normal for multiple copies of draft/blank documents to be kept with the deeds despite their clearly not being worth the paper they were printed on for any purpose other than lighting a fire. An awful lot of photocopies/drafts/duplicates got shredded during my time in the legal world— quite openly, not like I was sneaking off with a bundle of paper after everyone else had gone home— and nobody once said a word against me doing it.

I did the conveyancing on my own home and took the same approach. The bundle of deeds which went to the lender was probably a quarter the size of the one which I got from the vendor's solicitor. It's been through two further remortgages (and solicitors) since and there's not been a whisper from anyone of any potential issue with any of the documents.

 

[Bronte]

Hi all

I have recently paid off my remaining mortgage and have received a pack from the mortgage provider advising The release of mortgage deeds to me.

However the pack they gave me is about 2 inches thick and contains so much legal related stuff from the purchase and even includes information from when the house was first built and when the prior owners bought it, plus our mortgage info. I cannot actually seem to find an official property deed or land registry document in my name

I thought I would just receive a 1 pager certificate similar to a company share certificate.

I am after going through this pack several times, i cannot identify any one thing that sticks out to be an actual deed.

Had a google search and read “the deeds don't look like anything they are a bundle of documents which contain any number of various documents”

Is that accurate? Seems a bit haphazard to me if so?

Appreciate any guidance or confirmation of what I should ensure is included..

Cheers
50

Is there not a schedule of the documents? (a list of the documents). I've just checked a file of mine here and one of the documents is a vacated mortgage from the prior owner. It's Registry of Deeds, it consists of the original mortgage document (20 pages) signed by the vendor around 1997 with the green stamps on it and then on the back page, last page is the vacate. That's where the bank has a stamp on it stating it's paid off and signed by the bank. After which the Registry of Deeds also stamps it to confirm it's 'satisfied' in their records.

 

[Bronte]

Just found our vacated mortgage too, it's the original mortgage signed by us, 4 pages, very basic, no stamps, and than is attached a newer A4 white sheet called vacating receipt signed by the bank.

 

[Clamball]

The solicitor can review them, 'schedule' them ( as in put them in the appropriate order - Title first, then Planning and Compliance etc.,etc)
They can advise on steps, if applicable, to have the Deeds sale ready- even if you don't intend to sell, it is good to know that all is in order.

This seems a very practical suggestion. Many houses are sold after the death of a parent, and a lack of a document can hold things up for months. If there is pressure on to sell because of paying back fair deal it just adds to the stress all around.

I am just thinking about our deeds. We bought out our ground rent years after we purchased the house and I doubt our solicitor put that important paperwork with the deeds, which were with the bank, so they are probably still in two different places and would be good to have together for a future sale.

And I am thinking about my father’s house which was built by my great great grandfather. There has never been a mortgage or loan so is there any slip of paper saying he is the owner. I must find out.