You just finished your refinance. You could not be happier. You shortened you loan term and lowered your rate. What could be better? Little did you know that the closing you completed would prevent the timely sale of your home. If you had just chosen an attorney to do your refi that knew what he or she was doing. When you refinanced you were paying off your existing loan. The loan was held by Big Bank and serviced by Mega-Servicer. The attorney that closed the loan sent your payment to Mega-Servicer and received a discharge. The discharge was then recorded at the registry of deeds. This process is completed thousands of times every day, but there are hundreds of things that could go wrong. What happened in this case was the refi-attorney that received the discharge did not check it before sending it to be recorded. The discharge was executed by Mega-Servicer but your loan was held by Big Bank. The discharge that was recorded is ineffective and the mortgage that was paid-off at your refi is still outstanding of record. You are now selling your home. The closing attorney contacts you to let you know that your mortgage has been improperly discharged and a new discharge has to be obtained and recorded. The buyer is requiring that you convey good marketable title free from all liens; your paid-off mortgage is still a lien. What are you going to do? The terms of your purchase and sale agreement may allow you to continue the sale for 30 days but now you cannot buy your new house because you were relying on the money from the sale of your old home. You may not be able to resolve your title issue within thirty days; maybe your buyer will walk. Total panic sets in. You may be defaulted under the terms of the agreement to buy your new home. You could lose your deposit. The dominoes that were supposed to be falling in such an orderly fashion are now stuck behind your improperly discharged mortgage. What if Big Bank has been merged or has been taken over by the FDIC how will you get the discharge and how long will it take. This all could have been avoided if the closing attorney that did your refi knew what he was doing. So when you are meeting with your lender let them know that you want to select the attorney to close your loan, do not let them make that decision for you, tell them you want to use Topkins & Bevans. Our years of experience dealing with real estate transactions allow us to make sure that not only is your closing conducted professionally and without incident but we will also make sure that all matters are properly taken care of. The mortgage we payoff will be discharged and the record title will be cleared properly. So when you go to sell your home you may encounter other issues but you will not encounter the improperly discharged mortgage we paid off.