Except: The loan holder (the "bank"), or their trustee, keeps the physical title, and you don't get it until the obligation has been satisfied. Until then, the actual title holder is the loan holder, regardless of whose name is on the front, as it has been used for collateral. You actually paid most of the cost with someone else's money, and that loan must be discharged before it becomes "yours." Remember mortgage burning parties?chabouk wrote:When you purchase a car, your name is on the title. The lender is listed as the lien holder, but the car is in your name and is your property.
On top of which, banks can and do repossess homes "at their whim" (don't ask me how I know), even if you have never missed a payment, just by selling to another loan holder who then makes a fiduciary claim on the home that shows the loan is not "performing." This was done quite often about ten years ago.
Absolutely, the term "homeownership" is in error when applied to a mortgage. The only portion of a home that a person owns free and clear is called the "equity" and is only that portion of the current sale value of the home that is over the remaining cost of the loan. It was a tragedy in the making when loan outfits began pushing second mortgages, which are loans against that equity (the collateral) -- thus once again removing any home-ownership by the mortgagee. (That would lead me into a much longer dissertation on the tragedy of the "free money" of the past 15 years, so I'll stop here.)
A car loses a large portion of its value from the first day, such that a "car-owner" may not truly own any portion of that car (the excess over current sale value) until the very late stages of the loan period. (I will avoid getting into the topic of tripling the cost of the car when borrowing.) I wouldn't recommend modifying a car while it's under a loan obligation.