MERS, or Mortgage Electronic Registration System, Inc., is a company formed by the residential mortgage lending industry to avoid paying government mortgage recording fees and to make it simpler to buy and sell residential mortgage loans. It is easier to understand what MERS is if you first understand why it was created. A mortgage loan has two parts: a promissory note and a mortgage instrument (mortgage deed or deed of trust). The mortgage instrument must be recorded with a governmental office. In most states, the governmental recording office is the County Clerk or County Recorder. In other states, like Connecticut, the governmental office is the Town Clerk. The governmental office charges a fee to record the mortgage instrument. Recording helps potential new creditors evaluate whether to accept the mortgaged property as collateral for a loan because it determines the order in which the creditors are paid if the property is sold. Recording also identifies the parties claiming interests in the property. This information can be necessary to foreclosure proceedings. It is also important to know where to direct questions about the claimed interest.
The mortgage securitization industry is in the business of buying, selling and pooling mortgage loans and then selling rights to receive a fraction of the payments on the mortgages in the pool. Every time a mortgage loan is sold, an “assignment of mortgage” or “mortgage assignment” is supposed to be filed with the government recording office. The assignment must specifically describe the individual mortgage being assigned and must be signed by the assignor. The recording office charges a fee for recording the assignment. Since securitizations involve hundreds or thousands of mortgage loans, it is burdensome to prepare and sign an assignment for each individual loan. It is also difficult and expensive to identify the proper recording office and to pay the recording fee for each assignment.
The mortgage industry formed MERS to avoid the burdens and costs associated with recording mortgage assignments. Think of MERS as a club, with membership open to mortgage loan originators, buyers and sellers. The mortgage loan originator who is a MERS member has the borrower sign a note payable to the originator and a mortgage instrument in favor of MERS. The borrower is charged the recording fee as a closing cost. The closing agent for the loan sees to it that the mortgage instrument is recorded in MERS’ name in the proper recording office. The member-originator can sell the loan to another MERS member without having to record a mortgage assignment. The buyer-member can also turn around and sell the loan without having to record an assignment. The members are supposed to report mortgage loan sales to MERS so that MERS can keep track of who owns which debt. If MERS receives an inquiry about a mortgage interest, or is named in a foreclosure proceeding, MERS notifies the member who owns the associated debt.
The industry’s theory is that MERS is merely a placeholder in the recording office for the owner of the debt. As we will see in future posts, however, there is an argument that giving the note to one party and the mortgage interest to another voids the mortgage interest such that the loan is unsecured.