How to add a name to a deed in Maryland

Adding a spouse, a partner or a grown child to your deed is one of the most common changes families make to a Maryland home. It is not a form you fill in at the courthouse: the owners sign a new deed, and that deed is recorded in the county land records. This guide explains how that works, the choices you make along the way, and what it does and does not change. For the full range of deed transfers we prepare and record, start at our deeds and estates page.

How adding a name works

The recorded deed cannot be edited. Instead, the current owners sign a new deed that grants the home to themselves and the person being added. Maryland law lets owners do this in one step. Owners can grant property to themselves and another person directly, without first deeding it to a go-between (once called a “straw man”).

For the new deed to work, it must:

• name the people giving the property (the grantors) and the people receiving it (the grantees);
• describe the property well enough to identify it, usually by copying the legal description from the current deed;
• say what interest is being granted and how the new owners will hold title;
• be signed and acknowledged before a notary; and
• be recorded. In Maryland, a deed does not take effect until it is signed and recorded.

Choose how the new owners hold title

The new deed has to say how the owners will hold the property together. That choice decides what happens when one owner dies and who has to sign later to sell or refinance.

Our guide to transferring a deed after a death explains what happens to a share that goes through an estate.

Think it through before you sign

Adding a name is a gift of part of your home, and it takes effect when the deed is recorded. A few things surprise people:

• You cannot undo it on your own. Once someone is on the deed, taking them off takes a new deed signed by them (see removing a name from a deed), or a court order.
• The new owner has to sign later, too. Selling the home, refinancing or taking out a home equity loan will usually need every owner’s signature.
• The new owner’s own problems can reach the home. A co-owner’s share may be affected by that person’s own debts, divorce or bankruptcy. Ask your attorney how this applies to the way you plan to hold title.
• If your goal is to pass the home on at your death, adding a name now is only one way to do it. A will, a trust or a transfer-on-death deed can name who receives the home without giving away a share today. If long-term care planning is part of the picture, talk to an elder law attorney before signing anything.

Taxes on the new deed

Maryland’s recordation tax and state transfer tax are charged on the consideration: the price paid for the property, including any mortgage the new owner assumes. When you add a family member as a gift, with no money paid and no loan taken over, there is generally no price for these state taxes to apply to. Several exemptions in Maryland law also apply to family deeds:

• Spouses. A deed between spouses or former spouses is not subject to recordation tax or the state transfer tax.
• Domestic partners. The same rule covers a deed for a residential property between domestic partners or former domestic partners, if the partners give the clerk the evidence of the partnership the law asks for (an affidavit and two supporting documents, such as a joint account or a joint lease).
• Close relatives and the mortgage. When the property goes subject to a mortgage to a child, stepchild, parent, stepparent, brother or sister, grandchild, grandparent or in-law, the loan balance the relative takes over is not counted for recordation tax or the state transfer tax.

County transfer taxes are set by each county’s own law, and they do not always follow the state exemptions. We check the county’s rules before the deed is recorded and claim each exemption on the intake sheet that goes to the clerk with the deed.

Taxes outside the deed, such as federal gift tax reporting and the tax cost (basis) of the share you give away, are questions for your tax adviser. Ask before you sign.

The mortgage stays where it is

A new deed changes who owns the home, not who owes the loan. The person who signed the mortgage still owes it, and the person you add does not become a borrower.

Most mortgages let the lender call the loan due if the property is transferred. Federal law limits that right on a home with fewer than five units for certain family transfers, including a transfer that makes the borrower’s spouse or children owners of the property. Even so, tell your lender before you sign, and read your loan papers. A later refinance or home equity loan will usually need every owner to sign.

Signing and recording the deed

1. We check the land records for how title is held today, the current legal description, and any mortgages, liens or judgments.
2. We prepare the deed. Maryland requires every deed to carry a certification that a Maryland attorney prepared it or supervised its preparation, or that one of the parties named in it prepared it. The deed also states the consideration, even when it is none.
3. Everyone signs before a notary. The current owners sign as grantors.
4. The county endorses the deed. Before a deed is recorded, the county’s tax collector confirms the property taxes due have been paid and endorses the deed.
5. We record it with the clerk of the circuit court in the county where the home is, together with the intake sheet the clerk requires, and the recorded deed is returned. Not sure which county your address is in? See which Maryland county your address is in.

Then update your homeowners insurance to name the new owner, and keep the recorded deed with your important papers.