mortgage
nounverbcommon in dialogue
- United Kingdom//ˈmɔːɡɪd͡ʒ//
- United States//ˈmoɹ.ɡɪd͡ʒ//
- Australia//ˈmoːɡɪd͡ʒ//
- New Zealand//ˈmoːɡəd͡ʒ//
- Scotland//ˈmɔɾɡɪd͡ʒ//
A legal agreement in which a borrower pledges real property as collateral for a loan used to purchase or refinance that property.
noun
- 1
A legal agreement in which a borrower pledges real property as collateral for a loan used to purchase or refinance that property.
The appriser, therefore, (as the holder of a mortgage was then called,) entered upon possession, and in the language of Hotspur, "came me cranking in," and cut the family out of another monstrous cantle of their remaining property.
- 2
obsoleteThe state of being pledged.
lands given in mortgage
Etymology
From Middle English morgage and Middle French mortgage, from Anglo-Norman morgage, from Old French mort gage (“dead pledge”), after a translation of judicial Medieval Latin mortuum wadium, with wadium from Frankish *wadi (“wager, pledge”). Compare gage and also wage. So called because rents and profits from the land were owed to the lender for as long as the gage existed (comparable to interest on a loan today), as opposed to the living gage, in which rents and profits automatically reduced the debt (paying it off over time).
verb
- 1
To borrow against a property, to obtain a loan for another purpose by giving away the right of seizure to the lender over a fixed property such as a house or piece of land; to pledge a property in order to get a loan.
to mortgage a property, an estate, or a shop
We mortgaged our house in order to start a company.
- 2
figurativeTo pledge and make liable; to make subject to obligation; to achieve an immediate result by paying for it in the long term.
She mortgaged her future for the pleasures of the relationship with the sculptor, a relationship she knew would be short.
Like a latter-day Faustus who has mortgaged his soul to the pursuit of his art, Harrison now desperately craves the paternal love from which his learning has estranged him.
Forms
- plural
- mortgages
- past tense
- mortgaged
- past participle
- mortgaged
- present participle
- mortgaging
- third person singular
- mortgages
mortgage · A legal agreement in which a borrower pledges real property as collateral for a loan used to purchase or refinance that property.
Mortimer · A British surname from Old French.Morton · Any of several places of that name (or Moreton) meaning…mortuary · Of or relating to death or a funeral; funereal.