Paying the debt is not the end of the paperwork
When the secured debt is paid in full, the borrower is entitled to have title back. But the public record still shows the lender holding title, so Georgia puts a duty on the holder to clear it. O.C.G.A. 44-14-3 requires the holder to cause the cancellation to be furnished to the clerk within 60 days of the date of the full payment.
If the holder does not, the borrower may make a written demand at least 61 days after payment, and then recover $500.00 as liquidated damages plus actual loss and attorney's fees.
Watch the numbers: it is 60 days and $500, not 30 days and $1,000. There is no cancellation fee set by the clerk that the borrower must pay first. In fact the grantor may request a payoff balance without charge under 44-14-64(h). And cancellation is not optional just because payment substantively reconveys title under 44-14-67; the record cancellation is still required.
Recording and priority
Georgia follows a race-notice rule. O.C.G.A. 44-2-1 states that "a prior unrecorded deed loses its priority over a subsequent recorded deed from the same vendor when the purchaser takes such deed without notice of the existence of the prior deed." O.C.G.A. 44-2-3 reinforces it by making an unrecorded voluntary deed void against a bona fide purchaser without notice.
So if a seller deeds to Buyer One, who never records, and then deeds to Buyer Two, who records without notice, Buyer Two wins. The trap is thinking delivery settles it: delivery binds the parties to each other, but it does not protect Buyer One against a later good-faith purchaser. The second conveyance is not void, and title does not return to the seller.
Record with the clerk of superior court of the county where the land lies, not the county tax commissioner.
The flat recording fee
O.C.G.A. 15-6-77, as amended by HB 288 effective January 1, 2020, sets a flat $25.00 fee for each instrument pertaining to real estate, regardless of page count. Recording a warranty deed and a security deed costs $25 + $25 = $50.00. The old $10-first-page schedule is gone, and Fulton County's extra $2 surcharge is local, not statewide.