Meri Brown and her Wet Bar of Tears

[Absolom]

She probably doesn't owe a million.  Lizzie's isn't worth a million is it?  With the refinance, part of the money would have gone to paying off the old mortgage and then she would have the balance to use.  It's basically a new mortgage replacing the old one to pull out the equity she'd built.  

ETA:  Zillow thinks the house and land are worth around $710K so having the last number as her current mortgage makes sense.

Edited January 5 by Absolom

[Denize]

Looking at the assessed value history, it has more than doubled in value since she bought it, and her current mortgage probably includes more borrowed against the equity to cover renovations and property taxes. It looks like she put a new roof on it, perhaps when those tall trees were removed in ~2021.  And she has paved the driveway & parking area, really keeping the place up.  I too suspect she only has the one mortgage that paid off the previous ones; common when refinancing at a lower interest rate.

Year  Property taxes Tax assessment

2023 $4,596 +9.8% $563,750 +17.9%

2022 $4,185 +27.6% $478,140 +39.6%

2021 $3,280              $342,570 +32%

2020   --                    $259,550 +11.1%

2019 $2,654 +0.6%  $233,710 +2.8%

2018 $2,638 -5.8%  $227,305 +2%

2017 $2,800 +7.9%   $222,885 +7.9%

Edited January 5 by Denize

[GeorgiaRai]

County records show the 2017 mortgage ($346,500) was paid off when Meri refinanced in 2018. 

The records look like she now has 2 mortgages - $308,000 (2018) and $485,000 (2023) - BUT as others have said, the older loan was probably just paid off with the new loan and a release is in process.  I don't know Utah laws but in Georgia, lenders have 90 days to get a release filed.

It's impressive that she was able to get a smaller loan in 2018 than what she needed to purchase the property in 2017. (What was going on in MeriWorld in 2018?) If she now has just the $485,000 mortgage (that gave her, say, $177,000 or so cash out) and if the Zillow value stated above is correct, I think she's in a pretty good situation equity-wise.

 

[General Days]

I think the article title is misleading and that it's a refinance, so the $485K will pay off the balance of the older loan. 

ADDED IN EDIT:

Apparently Jenn & Meri mentioned this in a Fridays With Friends video, the other day.

Meri just refinanced. Part of the new loan paid off the old one and the rest is going toward reservations. She doesn't have a million+ in loans.

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/DEYiJ6VsHl9/

Edited January 6 by General Days
Added info and a link

[ginger90]

[laurakaye]

Meri and Jen did a semi-cleverly edited video (I saw it on Tik Tok) and they have their own page called Salty Birches.  Jen ends the video by saying "F*** you, Kody!"  

I guess I have mixed feelings with Janelle selling t-shirts based on Kody's quotes and now Meri's Kody-bashing channel.  On the one hand, might as well make a profit over the stupid and vile things that Kody says, while he lives in a multi-million dollar home with his pretty shy wife and tries to screw them out of whatever money he can.  On the other hand, it feels like dirty money - these women will never be able to cut Kody out of their lives if they are marketing off of things he says.

On the third hand, if Kody could just keep his horrible stupid thoughts to himself, his exes would have nothing to profit from and we all know that he can't do that, so - well played, OG's.