Also written as:
MERS
The Mortgage Electronic Registration System — a private registry that tracks mortgage ownership and servicing changes electronically, so loans can be sold without recording every transfer at the county courthouse.
MERS — the Mortgage Electronic Registration System — is a private electronic registry created in the 1990s to track mortgage transfers without having to record every change at the county recorder's office. When a mortgage is sold from one investor to another, MERS records the transfer in its system instead.
The system saves the mortgage industry billions in recording fees and speeds up the secondary mortgage market. For most borrowers, MERS shows up as the named lender on the deed of trust or mortgage document (technically "MERS, as nominee for the lender") even though the actual lender is a separate company.
MERS isn't who you pay. Your monthly payment goes to your servicer. MERS just tracks who legally owns the loan behind the scenes — useful information if you ever need to know who has authority over your mortgage.
Example
You look up your mortgage in county records and see "MERS, Inc., as nominee for Benchmark Mortgage." That doesn't mean MERS owns your loan — it means MERS tracks the ownership. To find your actual loan owner, you can search the MERS Servicer ID system using your loan number.
Also known as
MERS, Mortgage Electronic Registration System, MERSCORP
Source:
MERS Servicer ID