# mortgage

> English word · Noun · IPA /ˈmɔː.ɡɪd͡ʒ/ · frequency rank #3,705

## Definitions
1. A legal agreement in which a borrower pledges real property as collateral for a loan used to purchase or refinance that property.
2. The state of being pledged.

## Etymology
From Middle English morgage and Middle French mortgage, from Anglo-Norman morgage, from Old French mort gage (“dead pledge”), after a translation of judicial Medieval Latin mortuum wadium, with wadium from Frankish *wadi (“wager, pledge”). Compare gage and also wage. So called because rents and profits from the land were owed to the lender for as long as the gage existed (comparable to interest on a loan today), as opposed to the living gage, in which rents and profits automatically reduced the debt (paying it off over time).

## Easily confused with
- **montage** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/montage-vs-mortgage)

## Common misspellings (12)
`mmortgage`, `morgtage`, `morrtgage`, `mortagge`, `mortgaeg`, `mortgagge`, `mortggae`, `mortggage`, `morttgage`, `motrgage`, `mrotgage`, `omrtgage`

## Source
Compiled from Wiktionary via kaikki.org (CC BY-SA). Data vintage: 2026-05-06.
Canonical page: https://plainspell.com/en/word/mortgage