It was a 15-year fixed-rate loan originated in 1987 that was paid off in 2002. I had never heard of ABN AMRO until I contacted Atlantic Mortgage to find out what the deal was with my title problem. It was they who told me I needed to contact ABN AMRO to get the satisfaction piece recorded. (shrug) I was under the impression at the time that Atlantic had just (roughly coincidental with my payoff) gone out of business and was “cleaning up” and sending the remnants of its business to ABN AMRO.
That would explain it. They probably outsourced the maintenance of the mortgage origination and history to ABN AMRO as they went out of business. As Atlantic had a legal obligation to see to it the records were retained for the life of the loan plus seven years, that's likely what happened.