If you’ve found a wrong property description on your mortgage, contact your mortgage servicer and the title company that closed your loan as soon as possible, and open a claim with your owner’s title insurer if you have one. An incorrect legal description creates a cloud on your title that can block a future sale or refinance, and the correction method depends on how serious the mistake is: a typo in a lot number may need only a sworn affidavit, while a completely wrong parcel may require a new deed or a court order. In most cases, the party who drafted the error pays to fix it.
Why This Needs Fixing Now
Every mortgage identifies the secured parcel by a legal description built from surveying references like metes and bounds or lot and block, not a street address. When that description is wrong, the mortgage may not clearly attach to the right piece of land, and the record carries a defect called a cloud on title. A cloud on title can prevent you from getting title insurance on a future transaction, and without title insurance, no lender will approve a buyer’s mortgage on the property. You cannot sell or refinance until it’s cleared.
The error also weakens your lender’s position. Courts have generally treated an incorrect legal description as a defect that makes the mortgage voidable rather than void, so the mortgage still has legal effect but is open to challenge. Both sides benefit from correcting the record before the description has to hold up in a contested proceeding.
Confirm the Error Before You Call Anyone
Pull your mortgage and find the legal description. It’s the dense paragraph of bearings, distances, lot numbers, or subdivision references. Compare it against three other records:
- Your deed. It should match the mortgage exactly. If the deed is right and the mortgage differs, the mortgage carries the error. If both are wrong, the problem started earlier in the chain of title.
- Your owner’s title insurance policy, which contains its own legal description of the covered parcel.
- Your property survey, if one was done at closing. A survey is especially useful when the issue involves boundary lines rather than a typo.
A single wrong digit in a lot number or a transposed bearing is not cosmetic. One digit off can describe a neighbor’s parcel or a lot that doesn’t exist.
Check Your Title Insurance First
If you bought an owner’s title insurance policy at closing, use it before spending money on an attorney. Standard policies list errors in recorded documents as a covered risk, and a wrong legal description falls squarely inside that coverage. When you file a claim, the insurer is obligated to fix the problem, compensate you for any loss, or hire an attorney to resolve it on your behalf. Policyholders routinely underuse this coverage.
Call the insurer named on your policy, describe the discrepancy, and ask them to open a claim. Remember that your owner’s policy protects you as the homeowner; the lender’s policy your lender required at closing protects only the lender. Both may end up involved, but the owner’s policy is the one that covers your costs.
If you never bought an owner’s policy, you’ll be working directly with the title company or closing attorney who made the error, or paying out of pocket.
Three Ways to Correct the Description
The right tool depends on the severity of the mistake. Three options, in order of complexity and cost.
Scrivener’s Affidavit
For minor clerical errors, a scrivener’s affidavit is the simplest fix. It’s a sworn statement identifying the specific mistake and providing the correct information, typically prepared and signed by the attorney, title agent, or closing professional who drafted the original document. Once notarized and recorded in the county land records, it becomes part of the public record and corrects the chain of title. This works well for transposed numbers, misspelled subdivision names, or small omissions where the correct description is obvious from surrounding documents.
Corrective Deed
When the error is more substantial, a corrective deed may be needed. This is a new deed that re-conveys the property from the original grantor to the grantee with the accurate legal description. It must reference the original recorded deed by its book and page number or instrument number so that anyone searching the title can follow the correction back. A corrective deed doesn’t create a new transfer; it fixes what the first deed got wrong. Because it needs the original grantor’s signature, you’ll need cooperation from the seller or their representatives, which can be a hurdle if years have passed.
Court Reformation
If the original seller is uncooperative, deceased without accessible heirs, or cannot be found, you may need to ask a court to reform the mortgage or deed. Reformation is an equitable action in which a judge orders the document rewritten to reflect what the parties actually intended. To succeed, you generally need to show that both parties shared the same understanding of which property was involved and that the written description failed to capture that agreement because of a mutual mistake. This is the slowest and most expensive route, potentially taking months and requiring attorney representation throughout.
Who Pays
The party who made the mistake generally bears the cost. If the title company or closing attorney drafted the wrong description, they are responsible for preparing and recording the corrective document. Most title companies handle this without charging you, both because professional standards require it and because resisting creates liability exposure. If you have an owner’s title insurance policy, the insurer may cover attorney fees, recording costs, and other expenses tied to clearing the defect.
Where things get harder is when the error has already caused real financial harm, such as a lost buyer or months of carrying costs on a property you couldn’t close on. Recovering those damages from a title company is possible but requires proving specific losses, and litigation costs can exceed what you’d recover. Get a candid assessment from an attorney before suing.
If no title insurance exists and no responsible party can be pinned down, you may end up paying yourself. A scrivener’s affidavit with attorney preparation and recording might cost a few hundred dollars. A corrective deed runs higher because of the added drafting and signatures. Court reformation is by far the most expensive, with attorney fees reaching several thousand dollars depending on complexity and whether the case is contested.
Steps to Get It Done
Once you’ve confirmed the error and identified which documents carry the correct description, work through these steps.
Contact your mortgage servicer’s servicing department first. Explain the discrepancy and send copies of the mortgage, the deed, and any survey showing the correct description. Your lender has a direct financial interest in properly identified collateral, and most cooperate quickly once the issue is documented.
Reach out to the title company or closing attorney who handled your original transaction at the same time. This is the party most likely to have caused the error, and in most cases they will prepare the corrective instrument at their own expense. Present the same evidence package. If you have an owner’s title policy, file a claim with the insurer as well; the insurer may take over the correction process entirely.
The title company or attorney will draft the affidavit or corrective deed, coordinate signatures, and submit it for recording with the county recorder or register of deeds. Recording involves a modest filing fee. Processing times vary. Some counties index new recordings within a few business days; others take several weeks or longer depending on backlog. Follow up with the recorder if you don’t see the correction reflected within 30 to 60 days.
After the corrective instrument is recorded, request an updated title search or title commitment to confirm the cloud is gone. Keep copies of every corrective document with your original closing paperwork.
If the Error Turns Up During Foreclosure
Lenders sometimes discover description errors only when they try to foreclose. The lender typically must ask the court to reform the mortgage before foreclosure can proceed. Courts have consistently held that an incorrect legal description makes a foreclosure judgment voidable rather than void, meaning the lender can usually amend the complaint and seek reformation in the same action. If you’re the borrower, the error doesn’t erase the debt, but it can create procedural delays and may give you additional time or leverage in settlement talks. An attorney experienced in foreclosure defense can tell you whether the description error creates any substantive defense in your specific situation.
When You May Need a New Survey
Sometimes the existing documents don’t clearly show what the correct description should be, especially when the error involves boundary lines rather than a lot number. Hiring a licensed surveyor to measure the property and prepare a new legal description from physical evidence on the ground can settle the ambiguity. Surveyors cross-reference historical markers, adjoining property records, and recorded plats, and the resulting survey becomes strong evidence if a dispute arises later. Costs vary by property size and terrain, but the investment pays off when the correct description is genuinely in question rather than simply mistyped.