The paying off your morgage doesn't pay post got me thinking. I always wanted to pay more on my house. I have always sean not having a morgage as having lots of available cash.

Or morgage is about 37% of our income Paying extra is not a possiblity. Living in area that now has average prices around 400K buying at the bottom of the market was the only way we could get in. Our home cost 136K 3 years ago and is now valued at 186K. The market here did not have the decline seen in other areas.

But from a tax point of view I don't see too much advantage, Itemizing our detections only puts us slightly over the standard deduction. I can see where with a larger morgage it would make a difference.

I know that there are areas that you can invest still and get better returns but at the same time I would love for my morgage not to take the 37% bite out of our income. Without a payment I would feel like I could live a little or rent out my home buy a new one and have the rent from this house pay most of the payment on a newer home. In this area with yearly 10% increases realestate seams like a far more stable market then stocks?

Ok So what % of your monthly income is your payment? does that affect you wanting or not wanting to pay it off.

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Kimberly Proud Mommy to Bethany Rose April 2006

I have no clue what % of our income our mortgage is and I have problems believing that people actually figure these things out!!! LOL!! I have really never considered paying off my mortgage. I probably only would start paying extra on that IF I had every other debt paid off.

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~Happiness is a large family~

Currently our mortgage is a very low percentage of our income, probably around 15 to 20%. I used to accelerate our mortgage pay-off but now that we have decided to move, it doesn't make sense to do that.

When we lived in CA, our mortgage situation was very similar to yours in WA. Our mortgage took a high percentage of our income (at first) and our equity was increasing because of the value of the house going up, not from paying down our mortgage. As a matter of fact, when we sold we walked away with hundreds of thousands of dollars in equity and it was almost all appreciation.

So our first rule is to not ADD to the mortgage. I know people who re-finance to take out equity everytime their appreciation increases. I don't do that.

Secondly, IF I was going to re-finance (ie: I noticed interest rates declining or I was planning to become a SAHM) to improve my cash flow, I'd work on paying down my mortgage balance while I had excess money available. After all, if you pay down a large mortgage you really don't see a benefit unless you're planning on changing the mortgage agreement in some way. The mortgage company isn't going to lower your monthly payment unless you ask them to re-amortize the loan.

As far as getting close to pay-off, there are two schools of thought. One says the smartest thing to do is save up your excess money then use it to pay-off your loan early. The other says, make additional principal payments to pay down the loan faster. It makes sense to save up the money if (1) the savings interest rate is higher than your mortgage interest rate and (2) you have the discipline to do this. It makes sense to pay down your loan if you think your income might be changing and you fear savings may end up going to another use. For instance, people who go from being double-income, no kids to single income with kids will have a harder time qualifying for a re-fi of their current mortgage if they no longer meet the income requirements. For that reason, if you know you're going to become a SAHM it might make sense to use your extra income to pay down tha mortgage so you're not later stuck with a loan you can't re-fi.

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"I've been rich and I've been poor but independently wealthy is where it is at."

When we bought our house we went WELL below what the bank said we could spend because we didn't want to be "payment poor" as people say. That being said, sometimes I REALLY WANT A NEW, EXPENSIVE HOUSE!!!

We will own our house when I am 40 years old so I am not in a hurry to make extra payments. That seems young to me! Something ALWAYS comes up that takes extra money anyway. If I came into a lot of money however, you better know I would pay it off!

We pay extra on out mortgage every month (we always have) and it makes sense for us. Our house will be paid off before our kids go to college and we have no other debt (except our cars which will be paid off next spring) and we put away alot for retirement and we have good college savings accounts for the kids. What we pay on our mortgage is currently 36% of our income (when we bought the house it was closer to 50%)