Balloon payment mortgage

 A balloon payment mortgage is a mortgage which does not fully amortize over the term of the note, thus leaving a balance due at maturity. The final payment is called a balloon payment because of its large size. Balloon payment mortgages are more common in commercial real estate than in residential real estate. A balloon payment mortgage may have a fixed or a floating interest rate.

An example of a balloon payment mortgage is the 7-year Fannie Mae Balloon, which features monthly payments based on a 30-year amortization. In the United States, the amount of the balloon payment must be stated in the contract if Truth-in-Lending provisions apply to the loan.

 Because borrowers may not have the resources to make the balloon payment at the end of the loan term, a "two-step" mortgage plan may be used with balloon payment mortgages. Under the two-step plan, sometimes referred to as "reset option", the mortgage note "resets" using current market rates and using a fully-amortizing payment schedule. This option is not necessarily automatic, and may only be available if the borrower is still the owner/occupant, has no 30-day late payments in the preceding 12 months, and has no other liens against the property. For balloon payment mortgages without a reset option or where the reset option is not available, the expectation is that either the borrower will have sold the property or refinanced the loan by the end of the loan term. This may mean that there is a refinancing risk.

 Adjustable rate mortgages are sometimes confused with balloon payment mortgages. The distinction is that a balloon payment may require refinancing or repayment at the end of the period; some adjustable rate mortgages do not need to be refinanced, and the interest rate is automatically adjusted at the end of the applicable period. Some countries do not allow balloon payment mortgages for residential housing: the lender must continue the loan (the reset option is required). To the borrower, therefore, there is no risk that the lender will refuse to refinance or continue the loan.

Mortgage

 A mortgage is a method of using property (real or personal) as security for the performance of an obligation, usually the payment of a debt.

 The term mortgage (from old French, lit. dead pledge) refers to the legal device used for this purpose, but it is also commonly used to refer to the debt secured by the mortgage, the mortgage loan.

 In most jurisdictions mortgages are strongly associated with loans secured on real estate rather than other property (such as ships) and in some cases only land may be mortgaged. Arranging a mortgage is seen as the standard method by which individuals and businesses can purchase residential and commercial real estate without the need to pay the full value immediately. See mortgage loan for residential mortgage lending, and commercial mortgage for lending against commercial property.

 In many countries it is normal for home purchases to be funded by a mortgage. In countries where the demand for home ownership is highest, strong domestic markets have developed, notably in Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

 Participants and variant terminology

Legal systems tend to share certain particular concepts but vary in the terminology and jargon used.

 In general terms the main participants in a mortgage are:

 Creditor

 The creditor has legal rights to the debt or other obligation secured by the mortgage. That debt is often the obligation to repay the loan by the creditor (or its predecessor lender) who provided the purchase money to acquire the property mortgaged. Typically, creditors are banks, insurers or other financial institutions who make loans available for the purpose of real estate purchase.

 A creditor is sometimes referred to as the mortgagee or lender.

 Debtor

 The debtor is the person or entity who owes the obligation secured by the mortgage, and may be multiple parties. Generally, the debtor must meet the conditions of the underlying loan or other obligation and the conditions of the mortgage. Otherwise, the debtor usually runs the risk of foreclosure of the mortgage by the creditor to recover the debt. Typically the debtors will be the individual home-owners, landlords or businesses who are purchasing their property by way of a loan.

 A debtor is sometimes referred to as the mortgagor, borrower, or obligor.

 Other participants

 Due to the complicated legal exchange, or conveyance, of the property, one or both of the main participants are likely to require legal representation. The terminology varies with legal jurisdiction; see lawyer, solicitor and conveyancer.

 Because of the complex nature of many markets the debtor may approach a mortgage broker or financial adviser to help them source an appropriate creditor, typically by finding the most competitive loan.

 The debt is, in civil law jurisdictions, referred to as hypothecation, which may make use of the services of a hypothecary to assist in the hypothecation.

 Legal aspects

 There are essentially two types of legal mortgage.

 Mortgage by demise

 In a mortgage by demise, the creditor becomes the owner of the mortgaged property until the loan is repaid in full (known as "redemption"). This kind of mortgage takes the form of a conveyance of the property to the creditor, with a condition that the property will be returned on redemption.

 This is an older form of legal mortgage and is less common than a mortgage by legal charge. In the UK, this type of mortgage is no longer available, by virtue of the Land Registration Act 2002.

 Mortgage by legal charge

 In a mortgage by legal charge, the debtor remains the legal owner of the property, but the creditor gains sufficient rights over it to enable them to enforce their security, such as a right to take possession of the property or sell it.

 To protect the lender, a mortgage by legal charge is usually recorded in a public register. Since mortgage debt is often the largest debt owed by the debtor, banks and other mortgage lenders run title searches of the real property to make certain that there are no mortgages already registered on the debtor's property which might have higher priority. Tax liens, in some cases, will come ahead of mortgages. For this reason, if a borrower has delinquent property taxes, the bank will often pay them to prevent the lienholder from foreclosing and wiping out the mortgage.

 This type of mortgage is common in the United States and, since 1925, it has been the usual form of mortgage in England and Wales (it is now the only form - see above).

 In Scotland, the mortgage by legal charge is also known as standard security.

 In Pakistan, the mortgage by legal charge is most common way used by Banks to secure the financing. It is also known as Registered Mortgage. After registeration of legal charge, Bank's Lien is recorded in land register stating that the property is under mortgage and can not be sold without obtaining NOC (No Objection Certificate) from the Bank.

 Equitable Mortgage

 In an Equitable Mortgage the lender is secured by taking possession of all the original title documents of the property and by borrower's signing a Memorandum of Deposit of Title Deed (MODTD). This document is an undertaking by the borrower that he/she has deposited the title documents with the bank with his own wish and will, in order to secure the financing obtained from the bank.

 History

 At common law, a mortgage was a conveyance of land that on its face was absolute and conveyed a fee simple estate, but which was in fact conditional, and would be of no effect if certain conditions were not met --- usually, but not necessarily, the repayment of a debt to the original landowner. Hence the word "mortgage," Law French for "dead pledge;" that is, it was absolute in form, and unlike a "live gage", was not conditionally dependent on its repayment solely from raising and selling crops or livestock, or of simply giving the fruits of crops and livestock coming from the land that was mortgaged. The mortgage debt remained in effect whether or not the land could successfully produce enough income to repay the debt. In theory, a mortgage required no further steps to be taken by the creditor, such as acceptance of crops and livestock, for repayment.

 The difficulty with this arrangement was that the lender was absolute owner of the property and could sell it, or refuse to reconvey it to the borrower, who was in a weak position. Increasingly the courts of equity began to protect the borrower's interests, so that a borrower came to have an absolute right to insist on reconveyance on redemption. This right of the borrower is known as the "equity of redemption".

This arrangement, whereby the mortgagee (the lender) was on theory the absolute owner, but in practice had few of the practical rights of ownership, was seen in many jurisdictions as being awkwardly artificial. By statute the common law position was altered so that the mortgagor would retain ownership, but the mortgagee's rights, such as foreclosure, the power of sale and the right to take possession would be protected.

 In the United States, those states that have reformed the nature of mortgages in this way are known as lien states. A similar effect was achieved in England and Wales by the Law of Property Act 1925, which abolished mortgages by the conveyance of a fee simple.

 Foreclosure and non-recourse lending

In most jurisdictions, a lender may foreclose on the mortgaged property if certain conditions—principally, non-payment of the mortgage loan—apply. Subject to local legal requirements, the property may then be sold. Any amounts received from the sale (net of costs) are applied to the original debt.

In some jurisdictions, mortgage loans are non-recourse loans: if the funds recouped from sale of the mortgaged property are insufficient to cover the outstanding debt, the lender may not have recourse to the borrower after foreclosure. In other jurisdictions, the borrower remains responsible for any remaining debt, through a deficiency judgment.

 Specific procedures for foreclosure and sale of the mortgaged property almost always apply, and may be tightly regulated by the relevant government. In some jurisdictions, foreclosure and sale can occur quite rapidly, while in others, foreclosure may take many months or even years. In many countries, the ability of lenders to foreclose is extremely limited, and mortgage market development has been notably slower.

 Mortgages in the United States

 Types of Mortgage Instruments

 Two types of mortgage instruments are commonly used in the United States: the mortgage (sometimes called a mortgage deed) and the deed of trust.

  The mortgage

 In all but a few states, a mortgage creates a lien on the title to the mortgaged property. Foreclosure of that lien almost always requires a judicial proceeding declaring the debt to be due and in default and ordering a sale of the property to pay the debt.

 The deed of trust

 The deed of trust is a deed by the borrower to a trustee for the purposes of securing a debt. In most states, it also merely creates a lien on the title and not a title transfer, regardless of its terms. It differs from a mortgage in that, in many states, it can be foreclosed by a non-judicial sale held by the trustee. It is also possible to foreclose them through a judicial proceeding.

 Most "mortgages" in California are actually deeds of trust. The effective difference is that the foreclosure process can be much faster for a deed of trust than for a mortgage, on the order of 3 months rather than a year. Because the foreclosure does not require actions by the court the transaction costs can be quite a bit less.

 Deeds of trust to secure repayments of debts should not be confused with trust instruments that are sometimes called deeds of trust but that are used to create trusts for other purposes, such as estate planning. Though there are superficial similarities in the form, many states hold deeds of trust to secure repayment of debts do not create true trust arrangements.

 Mortgage lien priority

 Except in those few states in the United States that adhere to the title theory of mortgages, either a mortgage or a deed of trust will create a mortgage lien upon the title to the real property being mortgaged. The lien is said to "attach" to the title when the mortgage is signed by the mortgagor and delivered to the mortgagee and the mortgagor receives the funds whose repayment the mortgage secures. Subject to the requirements of the recording laws of the state in which the land is located, this attachment establishes the priority of the mortgage lien with respect to other liens on the property's title. Liens that have attached to the title before the mortgage lien are said to be senior to, or prior to, the mortgage lien. Those attaching afterward are said to be junior or subordinate. The purpose of this priority is to establish the order in which lien holders are entitled to foreclose their liens in an attempt to recover their debts. If there are multiple mortgage liens on the title to a property and the loan secured by a first mortgage is paid off, the second mortgage lien will move up in priority and become the new first mortgage lien on the title. Documenting this new priority arrangement will require the release of the mortgage securing the paid off loan.