Vermont Discharge of Mortgage (Individual)

A paid off mortgage stays on a Vermont town's land records until the holder puts a discharge there. This form prepares that discharge under 27 V.S.A. section 463 in the individual mortgagee configuration: one private holder of the mortgage, signing the statutory certificate of satisfaction in an individual capacity and recording it with the town clerk.

The certificate Vermont law puts in the record

Section 463 is Vermont's discharge by separate instrument. The statute supplies a short form of certificate, an acknowledgment of satisfaction stating that the described mortgage is paid in full and satisfied and identifying the mortgagor, the mortgagee, the date of the mortgage, and the book, page, and town of its recording. Under section 463(b), when that satisfaction is acknowledged before a notary public and recorded, it discharges the mortgage and bars actions brought on it. The form carries the statutory certification language in its operative section and collects the identifying particulars in numbered sections: mortgagee, mortgagor, the mortgage's recording references, any recorded assignments, and the property. A release of mortgage prepared this way reads the way Vermont town clerks and title examiners expect to find it.

One individual holder, one signature

The form recites a single mortgagee who holds the mortgage of record as an individual and signs in that capacity, over one signature line and one acknowledgment certificate. Seller financed sales where the seller took back a mortgage at closing, private loans between relatives secured against Vermont real estate, and mortgages acquired by an individual investor through a recorded assignment present this pattern; the assignment section carries the recording references that connect an assignee to the original mortgagee. The form is not set up as a discharge by a bank or company, which an officer or authorized agent signs in a representative capacity, and it is not the attorney discharge that 27 V.S.A. section 464a describes or a fiduciary discharge for a deceased mortgagee's estate.

The thirty day clock after payoff

Vermont attaches real deadlines to the mortgage payoff. Under 27 V.S.A. section 464, a mortgagee who receives a written request provides a payoff statement within five business days, and within 30 days after full performance of the conditions of the mortgage, the mortgagee of record executes and delivers a valid and complete discharge, together with any instrument necessary to show record ownership of the mortgage. A holder who lets the 30 days pass is liable for statutory damages of $25.00 per day, up to $5,000.00 in the aggregate, and a substantially prevailing aggrieved party can add consequential damages, punitive damages, costs, and attorney fees. Those provisions reach individual holders as fully as institutional ones, which is what makes a ready to record satisfaction form useful on the private side of the market.

Town land records, not a county recorder

Vermont records land instruments town by town; there is no county recording system. The discharge goes to the clerk of the town whose land records contain the mortgage, identified by book and page exactly as the clerk's stamp on the recorded mortgage shows them, and the statewide recording fee is $15.00 per page under 32 V.S.A. section 1671. No property transfer tax return accompanies a discharge, since the transfer tax falls on transfers by deed of title rather than on the release of a lien. Where a mortgage was recorded in more than one town because the land lies in two towns, a discharge is recorded in each town whose records carry it.

The download includes the discharge of mortgage as a fillable PDF, a completed example showing the certificate, signature, and notary blocks filled in for a realistic Town of Milton fact pattern, and a plain language guide that walks through every section, the signing and notarization formality, and the recording step. The materials describe Vermont law in general terms and are not legal advice.