Trip to the Central Mortgage Office

In learning about all of the aspects of the registry system in Lithuania my director organized a field trip to the Centrine Hipotekos Įstaiga - Central Mortgage Office.

This Mortgage Office has the following functions. It manages:

1. Mortgage Register

2. Register of Property Seizure Acts

3. Register of Wills

4. Register of Marriage Settlements

5. Register of Pre-nuptial Contracts

6. Submitting data concerning registers which are being managed; following the order provided by the legal acts

7. Determining connections and exchanging available data with the other registers of the State

8. Performing other functions prescribed by the legal acts.

Don’t let the name fool you! Although the formal title Central Mortgage Office instantly eludes that this body is purely a Mortgage registration office, it does (as listed) much more. Part of the reason why the name of this establishment is so deceiving is due to the fact that when a title for this entity was being thought of “Registru Centras” Registry Center was taken by the other organizations mentioned in the blog that register Legal entities and Property. There is talk of combining all of the registering bodies in Lithuania into one Registry Center, however this will take time. It was also suggested that when the Central Mortgage Office was formed, because it had the expertise and the technology to register things, in time it naturally received more responsibilities and things to register.

Three Registry Specialists from my department and I went to the Central Mortgage Office last week. Taking just a few minutes to walk over to the building, we entered and met the Director of Registry. The director- Antanas Baronas casually introduced himself, and quickly began scurrying through the labyrinth of hallways and narrow staircases, pointing out all the improvements they had made in the past few years. He stopped to point out a sequence of pictures of what the building looked like before the Ministry of Justice renovated it for the Central Mortgage Office. My eyes were shocked to see how dilapidated the building was before the reconstruction. While the basic form of the building still existed, the broken windows revealed weeds growing inside the rooms, and an open ceiling letting the elements into the architectural treasure. While in the United States such an eyesore would have long ago been torn down replaced by a CVS Pharmacy, yet in Lithuania the building was completely overhauled and now put to practical use. The building maintains it’s “Smetona Era” dignity and sits in an area highly tracked by tourists. It was a great financial and cultural investment to restore the building, and now workers and onlookers alike can respect it's restored beauty.

In addition to my architectural fascination with the building, I did also find what went on inside interesting! Continuing on the tour, the other girls and I entered a large executive style meeting room where a power point presentation and a Legal Staff sat formally around the table waiting for us. We were invited to be seated, and found pens and pads of paper placed in from of each of our seats. The lights dimmed, and the power point about the Central Mortgage Office began. An overview of the functions was displayed followed by statistical information regarding what the Central Mortgage Office registers and how the respective registries have changed over time. They cited how the economic crisis has increased Property Seizure Acts (growing from a handful a week to 20 a day) and how the mortgage register has decreased because people are no longer buying homes at the same rate as a few years ago. Regarding the register of pre-nuptial contracts, I found it interesting that this practice is not very popular and as one specialist said “eludes that a person is thinking about divorce before they are even married”. Interestingly enough, the divorce rate in Lithuania is similar to that in the United States and I gather that the more westernized Lithuania becomes, the more such practices will be used.

Regarding the Register of Wills, I found it interesting to learn that all wills are endorsed by a Notary, kept by the Notary, and registered in the Register of Wills at this Central Mortgage Office. I asked the question - if the Will is kept in the hands of a Notary, why further register it. The answer is that many times family members mentioned in a person’s final testament are unaware who the Notary holding on to the will is. The Will itself is kept as an utmost secretive sensitive document, and will only be shown to anyone with the approval of the writer (and obviously becomes open in the event of the writer’s death). Sometimes the Notary may die or move offices, and relatives have a hard time retrieving the final written statement. The Registry of Wills therefore serves as a general database that does not contain the secrets of the final testament, rather makes note of the Notary (name, address) holding on to the paper.

During my trip to the Lithuanian Central Mortgage Office, I further gained understanding regarding the process and bodies involved in the registration process. This field trip clarified the misconceptions I had regarding the title of the establishment, and allowed me to analyze and make conjectures about the Lithuanian economy based on the graphs and expert analysis that was presented to me. I believe that I am gaining a “micro” look into on small part of the Lithuanian Governmental System, but from this one small part I gain a deeper grassroots understanding of what is going on. The structure and function of something as simple as a “registry” gives me deep insight into all other facets of the political system.