What happens when the mortgage is paid off?

[ReviewingTheSituation]

Just that really... Our final payment went out this week, so we have paid off the mortgage. We've had nothing from the bank to say we have to 'do' anything, but now that we own the house outright, it feels like there should be some course of action that makes things official?

I've heard/read that we don't need the physical deeds any more (I don't actually know where the deeds would be - do the mortgage company have them?), although it would be quite nice to have them. But how do we prove that the house is ours/put it in our name?

It feels like a momentous thing - all of a sudden, we own this asset, but apart from the fact we're living in it, there's nothing to say so. When a car is sold, you have to fill in a bit of paper for DVLA giving the name of the new owner - it feels like something similar should happen for a house?

Can anyone who's been-there-done-that enlighten me?

How about opening a bottle of champagne and getting a nice take away or something?

Well we'll do that too - but I want to make sure the official side of things is in order!

if the property is registered (which it should be unless you bought a loooong time ago) the mortgage company should remove themselves from the property title.

all explained here:
www.land-search-online.co.uk/information/how-to-remove-a-mortgage-entry/

in addition you need to sign up to property alerts with the land registry to prevent fraud.
www.gov.uk/protect-land-property-from-fraud

A flash-mob come round to your house to celebrate 🍾 🥂
😂😂😂

More seriously, nothing really, other than you have the spare cash each month.
It's already in your name, but the mortgage company has a charge - which as the PP says they should remove.
Our mortgage company sent their paper copies of the deeds, but this was 14 years ago. They were just copies of info we'd had when we purchased the house though. Land registry information etc.

When we paid off we eventually received a form from the Land Registry telling us that the mortgage company had removed themselves from the title.

If your house insurance was dealt with through your mortgage company you will need to take out insurance on your own account.

oh, and save a good amount each month for home maintenance.

Why is that any more relevant today compared to the day they first moved in?
The mortgage company doesn't maintain your home.

How exciting for you op!!

Nothing happens. It’s a massive anti climax. Give it a couple of weeks and check with the land registry online and you’ll see the bank has removed itself. Or set yourself up to get notifications when anything changes on your house and you’ll be notified when they do.

That's useful - thanks. Will do the fraud thing now, and make a mental note to check that Barclays take themselves off the property title.

And yes - it is exciting, but somewhat anti-climactic! We've paid it off purely by coming to the end of the term, not through some big windfall etc, so it's essentially just done what it needed to do, and run its course. It's odd really, because it feels like such a milestone, but also unremarkable.

The other odd thing about it, is that it's like someone said on a post the other day, you don't/can't really tell anyone in real life - it feels a bit like a dirty secret. So strange really, as it's just 25 years since we bought a house, and now we've paid for it. But you feel guilty about being mortgage free when you know your friends/peers aren't.

Maybe we should buy a bigger house and take out a new mortgage so we fit in with our friends!!

You could phone the Mortgage company and ask

It is an anti climax, we paid ours off during lockdown (we had the funds to do it, but were holding off for the apocalypse). At least we didn’t owe anyone any money and no one could take it off us.
We save that amount each month now.

We paid ours off a couple of months ago and it took about a month for the land registry letter. Huge anti climax after scrimping and saving to pay it off early 😂

We paid ours off just recently. We have had a letter from the Mortgage company confirming this and saying that they have informed Land Registery.

Congratulations, OP! That is amazing. We are hoping to pay ours off early. It's a huge achievement.
I am just wondering how there would be fraud with property titles? And how can you prevent fraud?

Definitely make sure that the mortgage company have removed the charge - someone I know went to sell their house many years after having paid off their mortgage and the bank hadn’t done this. To make it harder, that bank had since been taken over by another. Was sorted but unnecessary stress!

I think we had a letter from the bank confirming that our mortgage has been paid off sometime later. Nothing else really happened. We had a celebratory dinner and gave ourselves a hug pat on the back 🤗

We deliberately keep a small amount of mortgage to pay each month as we don’t want the responsibility of owning the deeds outright. Something in the news he had read about someone fraudulently steeling someone’s deeds of property. So we remain cautious.

A friend of ours put it all over Facebook when he’d paid his mortgage off ….. not the brightest idea when you own a local business. Everyone expected cheaper quotes etc 🤦‍♀️

Too late for that @Stapleton143! It's paid. I think it would have been more hassle to extend it, as it was at the end of its term - we haven't paid it off early or as a lump sum, so we'd probably have had to jump through hoops to do that.

I think physical deeds are much less 'valuable' these days anyway, so I'm not worried about having them here.

Congratulations! The only thing to remember is to take out your own buildings insurance. It was probably tied in with your mortgage previously.

I’ve never heard of building insurance being tied into the mortgage. A requirement of it, yes, but always the borrowers responsibility to source and pay for.

Anyway, all that happened when we paid our mortgage off was a letter from the bank after a few weeks, and then from the land registry some time after. But this was a few years back now, and the land registry is currently dealing with a backlog, so who knows!

I seem to remember many years ago that buildings insurance with the mortgage was the default option, but that you could opt out and have your own. But I don't think this has been the case for many years. Insurance all in place anyway - buildings and contents (although I guess I need to let the insurance co know that it's owned outright now rather than mortgaged).

I'm in Scotland and our mortgage will end in December. It's my understanding that we need a solicitor to finalise things but that could be scotland specific. Also if any fellow Scots know differently please say as I'd like to know!