mortgage

Money borrowed to buy a home, which you usually pay back over many years.

• We pay our mortgage every month.
• She took out a mortgage to buy the flat.
• Higher interest rates have made mortgages more expensive.

How to use it: mortgage on something (They still have a mortgage on their house.)

Similar words: home loan

Common phrases: take out a mortgage, pay the mortgage, mortgage payments

A legal agreement allowing a lender to take your property if you fail to repay a loan.

• They signed the mortgage deed.
• The mortgage gives the bank rights over the property.
• A solicitor checked the terms of the mortgage.

How to use it: mortgage on something (The lender registered a mortgage on the property.)

Common phrases: mortgage deed, mortgage on something, register a mortgage

To borrow money using property as a promise of repayment; the lender can take it if you cannot pay.

• They mortgaged their house.
• She mortgaged her home to fund the business.
• Would you mortgage your property to pay for the course?

How to use it: mortgage something to do something (They mortgaged their house to open a restaurant.)

Common phrases: mortgage a house, mortgage someone’s home, mortgage a property, mortgage an estate

To gain something now in a way that limits your choices or causes problems later.

• We must not mortgage our future.
• The government mortgaged the next generation’s future for short-term gains.
• Are we mortgaging our children’s future by using all these resources?

Similar words: jeopardize, compromise

Common phrases: mortgage the future, mortgage someone’s future