How do I find out if a property has a mortgage on it?

[Tina Chau]

Hi, does anyone know how I can find out if a property has a mortgage on it and how much that mortgage is?  Is there a website I can go on to get that information?  Is it public record?  Thanks!  The property is in pinellas county (clearwater)  

[Stephan K.]

Look it up here:

https://officialrecords.mypine...

Let me know if you need help. 

[Sergey A. Petrov]

Pay a title company for a title report. If you asking whether or not a property has a mortgage, the chances are you should think beyond just a mortgage…

[Mark Fein]

The county court of clerks website will tell you if they have a recorded mortgage.   It will say how much of a mortgage they obtained but not the current balance.   You can play around with an amorization table and make an educated guess based on the info found on public record.

[Patrick Drury]

@Tina Chau
Google the county recorder's office for where you live and it will have that info.

[Joseph Stern]

@Tina Chau Hey Tina, mortgages are recorded and public record most of the time, you can access this info at the county clerk website where you can sort by document type (mortgage) and see the amount taken out. You can also use platforms like batchleads where you can simply search the property and it will show details like remaining mortgage balance. Hope that helps!

[Chris Mason]

Quote from @Tina Chau:

Hi, does anyone know how I can find out if a property has a mortgage on it and how much that mortgage is?  Is there a website I can go on to get that information?  Is it public record?  Thanks!  The property is in pinellas county (clearwater)  

 The folks above are correct that you can check out the county recorder's office / public records, which may entail having to go down there in person during gov't work hours.

You can also ask your realtor or loan officer, who may be more available, and can send it to you via email. 

You can also pay a title company for the same report -- they give loan officers and realtors free access. 

This will not tell you the current balance, however. It'll tell you a $500k conventional mortgage was recorded in July 2021, you can infer from the ownership record that it was a refi (same owner before/after), and you can ballpark that rates were around 3%, assume it's a 30YF, so the balance "should" be X, but you have no way to know if they made a large lump sum payment, pay extra each month, etc. 

You can also infer other things. For example if someone has owned a house for 5 years, but did NOT refinance in 2020/2021, they left thousands of dollars per year on the kitchen table, which most people will not voluntarily do if they have another choice. So maybe they didn't have another choice, maybe they had lost their job and couldn't refinance. Which in turn could give you insight into their financial position. If they took forbearance (which you can only speculate on) and didn't make a payment for 12 months, their current balance would likely be higher than what the guess from the above paragraph would indicate. 

Ultimately it's all guesses, and if they have a listing agent, being able to use this will be limited, part of the whole point of having representation is to blunt such efforts. 

The "you should refi!" junk mail, from random companies, with spookily accurate details on your current mortgage? This is where that comes from. 

[Tom Gimer]

@Chris Mason Try estimating payoffs on mortgages originated in 2006 on properties in foreclosure now! 

[Tom Gimer]

For context — anybody who works in foreclosures — many sales are on HOA or COA liens. The older the mortgage the less certain you can be of the balance you'll inherit. You can be WAY OFF with older liens … think neg am and some lienholders are just bad at protecting their interests.

[Debra Howard]

Quote from @Sergey A. Petrov:

Pay a title company for a title report. If you asking whether or not a property has a mortgage, the chances are you should think beyond just a mortgage…

[Sandeep Dhall]

I use Propstream to get that information

[David Torres Jr]

Sandeep Dhall, how accurate and up to date is Propstream when someone is looking for mortgage information?