In a straight-forward application of the relevant recording statute, the Massachusetts Land Court has held that a son who received a deed to the land without notice of a prior reverse mortgage is not subject to the mortgage since it was not recorded and he had no other means to achieve notice of it. https://www.lexisnexis.com/clients/macourts/ 57 N.E.3d 1065 (Mass. App. Ct. 2016).

Many mortgage agreements allow the lender to change the locks on the door and take over the property when a borrower-mortgagor defaults or abandons the property; this is intended to prevent the property from becoming dilapidated or taken over by squatters. However, some banks have locked owners out of their homes after they default even if they are still living there and there is no evidence of abandonment or harm to the premises.

The Washington Supreme Court outlawed this practice in  ...

The Nebraska Supreme Court has joined other courts that have held that a bank that holds the mortgage note may foreclose on the property even if there is no evidence of a valid chain of mortgage assignments and some doubt about whether the foreclosing party has the right to foreclose. Marcuzzo v. Bank of the West, 862 N.W.2d 281 (Neb. 2015). The theory is that the holder of...

Pennsylvania statutes have language that might have been interpreted to require transfers of interests in land (through deeds or mortgages) to be recorded to be valid. If true, that would have undermined the MERS system of mortgage registration. But the Third Circuit gave MERS a win and interpreted Pennsylvania law to recognize mortgage transfers at the moment they are signed; recording is not required for the transfer of the property interest to be valid but is simply for the convenience of the parties and subsequent conveyees. The case,...