Wyoming Release and Satisfaction of Mortgage (Partial Release of Mortgage)

A Wyoming mortgage that covers two lots, or a house and the acreage behind it, does not have to be paid off before one of those parcels can be sold or refinanced free of the lien. This Wyoming Partial Release of Mortgage is the instrument by which one or two mortgagees holding a recorded mortgage in their own names release a single described parcel from the lien while the mortgage continues in full force on everything else it describes. The pattern appears where a private lender or seller-financer holds the mortgage and the borrower sells off a piece of the mortgaged land; the instrument is not a satisfaction of the mortgage.

A lien that narrows without ending

Wyoming's mortgage-discharge statute is written for a mortgage that has been paid in full. Section 34-1-130 of the Wyoming Statutes directs the county clerk to discharge a mortgage upon the record when a certificate or deed of release is recorded specifying that the mortgage has been paid or otherwise satisfied or discharged. A partial release says the opposite on its face: the debt remains, and the mortgage continues as a lien on the remaining property. The county clerk does not discharge the mortgage when a partial release is recorded. The recorded instrument instead sits in the chain of title of the released parcel as a conveyance under Section 34-1-102, which reaches every written instrument by which title to real estate may be affected, and it gives notice to later purchasers from the moment it is delivered to the clerk under Section 34-1-121. The buyer of the released lot, and any title insurer writing a policy on it, reads that recorded release rather than the lender's letter.

The released parcel and the remainder, each described

The form carries two property sections rather than one. Section 4 describes the Released Property, the parcel leaving the lien, by county, legal description, street address, and parcel number, and it describes only that parcel. Where the mortgage covered several platted lots, that description is the one lot being released; where the parcel is being carved out of a larger tract, it is a new metes and bounds or survey description written so the parcel can be located on the ground, with an exhibit page recorded behind the form when it runs long. Section 5 then identifies the property that remains subject to the mortgage, so the record shows at a glance what the lien still covers. Section 6 does the legal work in fixed text with no blanks: for valuable consideration, the mortgagee releases and discharges the Released Property from the lien of the Mortgage, the Mortgage continues in full force and effect on all of the property it describes other than the Released Property, and the instrument is not a satisfaction and does not discharge the secured indebtedness. A closing sentence confines the release to that one mortgage, so nothing else of record is touched.

Why the thirty-day release statute does not run here

Section 34-1-132 gives a mortgagee thirty days after a certified-mail request to execute a release, with daily damages for delay, but only where there has been full performance of the condition of the mortgage. A partial release is given while the debt is still outstanding, so it rests on the parties' own agreement, whether a partial release clause in the loan documents or the lender's consent at the time of a sale or subdivision. The form records the result of that agreement. Its consideration recital states that consideration was received without naming an amount, because the size of any partial payment, and whether the loan balance changed, are matters between the parties that the county record does not carry.

One or two mortgagees, releasing part of the land

This configuration recites one or two natural persons who hold the mortgage in their own names and sign in their own right, releasing a described parcel while the mortgage survives on the rest. The Mortgagee(s) block is free-form, taking one name or two with mailing addresses and nothing preprinted about marital status, ownership form, or capacity; the form carries a signature block and an acknowledgment certificate for each of two mortgagees, and a single mortgagee leaves the second of each blank. An assignee who took the mortgage by a recorded assignment identifies that assignment in Section 3, so the person releasing connects to the mortgagee of record through the county's own chain. Co-lenders, and spouses who financed a sale together, present the two-mortgagee pattern this form recites; the lender whose borrower is selling one lot out of a two-lot mortgage, or splitting a tract to refinance the house separately from the land, presents the partial release pattern. The form is not set up as a release by a bank, company, trustee, personal representative, servicer, or attorney-in-fact, as a release by a title insurer or title agent under the separate statutory procedure of Sections 34-1-145 through 34-1-150, as a release of an undivided fractional interest, or as the full release and satisfaction that follows payoff, which is a different instrument recorded separately and not included in this package.

Acknowledgment and recording in a Wyoming county

The mortgagee signs and acknowledges the release before a notarial officer, since Section 34-1-113 requires conveyances to be acknowledged and Section 34-1-118 makes the certificate of acknowledgment what entitles the instrument to record. Each certificate on the form uses the Section 32-3-115(a)(i) short form sentence, acknowledging the record before the officer on a stated date by a named person, and leaves room for the rectangular stamp in blue or black ink that Section 32-3-116 prescribes; under Section 32-3-106 an acknowledgment taken in another state before that state's officer carries the same effect, so a mortgagee who has moved away acknowledges where that person now lives. The instrument is recorded with the county clerk of the county where the released parcel lies, the same county whose clerk recorded the mortgage, for the statewide fee of twelve dollars for the first page and three dollars for each additional page under Section 18-3-402(a)(xvi). No Statement of Consideration accompanies it: Section 34-1-142 is written for documents transferring title, and a partial release names no grantee and transfers none, although the deed by which the released lot is sold carries its own and is prepared separately. Wyoming imposes no transfer tax on a recorded instrument. The form reserves the top two inches of its first page for the clerk's recording label and prints its body in twelve point type, meeting the margin and type-size rules that Natrona, Sweetwater, and Campbell Counties publish.

Three items make up the package: the fillable Wyoming Partial Release of Mortgage form; a completed example, filled in for a Laramie County fact pattern in which two seller-financers release the vacant lot their buyers are selling while their mortgage stays on the lot with the house; and the guide, which takes each numbered section, both acknowledgment certificates, and the trip to the county clerk in turn. The guide and this description explain the form and the Wyoming statutes behind it in general terms only and are not legal advice.