A mortgage has a product term and a mortgage term, the mortgage term is the total amount of time you will have the mortgage (typically 10 to 25 years) where the product term is how long you will be tied into a fixed rate (normally 2 to 5 years) The borrower promises to repay the borrowed money on a certain date and if it is a repayment mortgage will have cleared the mortgage in full by the end of the mortgage term. The borrower transfers the property to the lender. The lender will re transfer the property when the money is repaid when the mortgaged property is absolutely transferred to the mortgagee. The land registry holds information on who owns a property and which properties have charges outstanding on them.