Assume v. Presume

Explain? For as long as I've been on this planet (and no doubt for a good length of time before that), applying to a financial institution (or even a private person) for help to purchase a property, in such a way that the property is actually owned by the financial institution until the debt is repaid (ie dead), is known as a mortgage. A home loan could be something else.
 
Black Hole said:
Explain? For as long as I've been on this planet (and no doubt for a good length of time before that), applying to a financial institution (or even a private person) for help to purchase a property, in such a way that the property is actually owned by the financial institution until the debt is repaid (ie dead), is known as a mortgage. A home loan could be something else.
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Your partner could mark your deeds with a mortgage, with your consent. The debt could be £1, a loan to you marked as a charge on the register.

What people cannot get is a home loan, ie, a sufficiently large loan to cover all or part of the value of their property. If they can get a home loan, the bank will then mark their deeds with a mortgage charge saying that the bank has an interest in the property until the loan is repaid. They (you) will then pay the registry office to remove that charge.

They are totally different concepts. It's like saying you can't get a receipt, when you mean you can't afford an item, and in so doing get a receipt. Unfortunately, mortgage has been corrupted into a loose term for a large home loan or mortgage loan. A mortgage loan can be a trivial amount, something anyone can obtain.
 
I think it's a case of the "mortgage charge" that gets registered with the land registry that is the corruption, mortgage loans have been around for longer than the land registry. Previously (and probably even now), the lender held the actual deeds as the security until the loan against them is paid off.
 
From the Barclays website:
Home loans can generally mean one of three things.
Firstly, it could mean that you wish to borrow money to buy a home, or change an existing loan you have on your home. This is also called a mortgage loan or a remortgage loan.
Secondly, home loans can refer to using the value in your home to raise finance for something else, like buying a car or consolidating debts. This is sometimes called home finance or a homeowner loan.
Thirdly, home loans can be used to describe equity release - a scheme that enables you to raise cash in exchange for a percentage of the equity in your home. You remain living in the home but it may be partly or wholly owned by a finance company when you die.

So they seem to regard Home Loans as loans secured on your property and a Mortgage is a specific type that is used for purchase (though that 'Firstly' para is a bit vague around the 'existing loan' bit.
Every other source I can find seems to say it's a loan for buying a house, so regardless of any 'correct' meaning of Mortgage I'd say that its usage has moved it firmly into that meaning.
 
Curious that the spelling of "daring" has migrated from the Middle English spelling "derring", but not in the phrase "derring do".
 
MikeSh said:
So they seem to regard Home Loans as loans secured on your property and a Mortgage is a specific type that is used for purchase (though that 'Firstly' para is a bit vague around the 'existing loan' bit.
Every other source I can find seems to say it's a loan for buying a house, so regardless of any 'correct' meaning of Mortgage I'd say that its usage has moved it firmly into that meaning.
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The Mortgage ("dead pledge") precedes the Land Registry considerably.

My objection is to saying that someone cannot get a mortgage. ANYONE can get someone to place a mortgage on their property: pay the fee and get them to loan you a trivial amount. What is more difficult is to get a mortgaged loan covering a considerable amount of the property value!
 
Mike0001 said:
My objection is to saying that someone cannot get a mortgage. ANYONE can get someone to place a mortgage on their property: pay the fee and get them to loan you a trivial amount. What is more difficult is to get a mortgaged loan covering a considerable amount of the property value!
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Yes, I suppose you are technically correct (if we assume that "ANYONE" is actually true - it might just be "most").
When someone says "We can't get a mortgage" the unsaid "... for the amount of money we need." is generally implied and assumed. If people said/wrote "We can't get a mortgage for the amount of money we need." in full every time they'd be considered rather strange (and no doubt welcome in here :)
 
I suspect that they might just be considered to be a tad on the pedantic side, and be scoffed at.
 
The mens' room or the men's room?

I saw mens' on TV tonight and it looked wrong but the missus thought it was correct. I remember similar examples in Eats Shoots and Leaves that I disagreed with.
 
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I'm surprised a possessive pronoun like "men's" has kept its apostrophe - there would be no confusion caused by leaving it out, and the long-term trend is to drop the apostrophe wherever possible.
 
If they can't get the fundamentals right, why should anyone have any faith in the rest of what they write?
 
TonyC said:
I can't find any evidence that "control" was ever an adjective.
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What evidence do you need? Is an adjective not a qualifying word, describing a property of the noun? "Remote control handset" - a handset which controls remotely. I admit to not being totally familiar with the nomenclature of grammar, so maybe "remote" is an adjective and "control" is a pronoun or something - but "handset" is definitely the noun!

I could go so far as to say that "control" refers to each individual button on the handset ("set" comes from the fact that it is an assembly - ie a set of parts).

Learned comment invited (as always).
 
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'Control' is either a verb or a noun. In the phrase 'remote control', 'control' is being used as a noun with its descriptive adjective 'remote' so a further noun is not required to describe the device. So "Point the remote control at the TV." is a fully formed sentence with 'remote control' as the subject, 'point' is the verb and 'TV' is the object with a couple of definite articles and a preposition thrown in for good luck. The addition of the word 'handset' adds nothing to the understanding of the sentence. Whereas "Point the handset at the TV" would have people picking up the 'phone handset, as this is the generally accepted meaning of the word.

Control
n.
1. Authority or ability to manage or direct: lost control of the skidding car; the leaders in control of the country.

2.
a. One that controls; a controlling agent, device, or organization.

b. An instrument or set of instruments used to operate, regulate, or guide a machine or vehicle. Often used in the plural.

Ref
 
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