Is DSCR Seasoning Measured From Closing or the Recording Date?

Three dates, and only one starts the clock

There are three dates floating around any purchase, and people conflate them constantly. The contract date is when you went under contract. The closing date is when you signed and funded. The recording date is when the county recorder officially files the deed and mortgage into the public record. For most DSCR lenders, seasoning starts on that last one.

Why recording and not closing? Because the recording date is the objective, third-party, public-record event a lender can verify independently. Your closing date lives in your settlement statement; the recording date lives at the county and can’t be fudged. Lenders anchor to the date they can confirm without trusting your paperwork.

Why the gap exists at all

In a clean transaction, recording happens the same day or within a day or two of closing. But the gap widens for ordinary, boring reasons — and none of them are in your control:

• The closing fell on a Friday or before a holiday, so recording slipped to the next business day.
• The county recorder’s office runs a backlog or only records in batches.
• An e-recording queue or a courier delay pushed the filing.
• A title or document correction had to clear before the recorder accepted it.

On a normal refinance none of this matters. It only bites when you’re trying to refinance the moment a seasoning window opens — then a deed recorded four days after closing means your six-month clock started four days later than you assumed, and your earliest refinance date moves with it.

How to find your recording date

You don’t have to guess. The recording date is public record and sits in several places you can check in minutes:

1. Look at the recorded deed or mortgage itself — the recorder stamps the date (and often a book/page or instrument number) in the top margin.
2. Search the county recorder’s or clerk’s online records by your name, the parcel number, or the property address.
3. Check your title insurance policy or the final settlement documents, which reference the recording information.
4. Ask your title company or closing attorney for the recording date and instrument number directly — fastest if the online portal is clunky.

Timing a cash-out around the recording date

If you’re running BRRRR and every week of trapped capital counts, treat the recording date as the real start line:

• Count your seasoning window from the recording date, not closing — then add a few days of cushion for processing.
• Start the refinance application a few weeks before the window opens so the appraisal and underwriting are ready to close right as you clear seasoning.
• Confirm with the specific lender whether they count from recording (most do) — a minority use a different anchor, and you want it in writing.
• If the timing is tight, ask whether a no- or short-seasoning program gets you there sooner, even at a small premium.

Knowing the exact day the clock started turns a vague “sometime around month six” into a date you can build the whole refinance schedule around — and it’s the cheapest week of capital you’ll ever recover, since it costs nothing but checking.

The bigger picture: seasoning is a moving target

The recording-date subtlety only matters because seasoning itself isn’t one fixed rule. The window depends on your refi type (rate-and-term versus cash-out), the value basis (cost versus appraised), and the individual lender — and six months is a default, not a law. The 6-month seasoning myth covers the paths that beat it.

Whatever window applies, anchor it to the recording date, then re-run the post-refi DSCR at the current STR rate to be sure the deal still clears the floor once the new loan is in place.