Paid Mortgage Off!!!

[401Killer]

Well, after about 15 years of a mortgage I stopped fkn around about 4 years ago and made the decision to destroy that loan. I put out about $84,000 in 4 years and squished that bill! All the while maxing out my 401k and contributing to my Vanguard account. The only debt I have now is my vehicle.

38(SINK), pushing $300k NW!

Now to just find my DINK partner... /hinthintwinkwink 



Very exciting times. =D

[Livingthedream55]

AWESOME!!!!   Congrats!!!!   : 0 )      What a great feeling!

[Socmonkey]

Great stuff! Your cash flow is going to be amazing without that payment! Might I recommend creating a Robinhood brokerage ($0 trades) account for all this money, since you max your 401k? After an IRA, of course.

[Cezil]

Woohoo!!  That is fantastic!  Congratulations!  :D

[El_Viajero]

That's rad. I've just made the decision to pay mine off early too because...

1. I could earn more by investing the extra in Vanguard funds, but I'm gonna have enough for the life I want anyway, so who cares?

2. I'll free up even more of my time SOONER by paying of the mortgage. I already only work 25ish hours per week, but still.

Feels great, I'll bet. There's a huge psychological benefit, methinks, to squashing that debt regardless of what the balance in your Vanguard account might have been.

[runewell]

That's rad. I've just made the decision to pay mine off early too because...

1. I could earn more by investing the extra in Vanguard funds, but I'm gonna have enough for the life I want anyway, so who cares?

2. I'll free up even more of my time SOONER by paying of the mortgage. I already only work 25ish hours per week, but still.

Feels great, I'll bet. There's a huge psychological benefit, methinks, to squashing that debt regardless of what the balance in your Vanguard account might have been.

Didn't you just contradict yourself?

I would make more by investing instead.  So investing would free up your time sooner rather than paying off the mortgage?

[henceforth]

Congrats! Can't wait to be in the same boat.

[minimalistgamer]

Congratulations! We did the same in January of this year. It is one of the best decisions we made in our lives.

[FIREby35]

Congrats. Feels great.

[BFGirl]

Congratulations!

[El_Viajero]

That's rad. I've just made the decision to pay mine off early too because...

1. I could earn more by investing the extra in Vanguard funds, but I'm gonna have enough for the life I want anyway, so who cares?

2. I'll free up even more of my time SOONER by paying of the mortgage. I already only work 25ish hours per week, but still.

Feels great, I'll bet. There's a huge psychological benefit, methinks, to squashing that debt regardless of what the balance in your Vanguard account might have been.

Didn't you just contradict yourself?

I would make more by investing instead.  So investing would free up your time sooner rather than paying off the mortgage?

Yeah, I can see how you might read it that way. Let me clarify: I can make more money over the long term by investing in some index funds and leaving the money there for the full life of my 30-year mortgage, but I'm choosing to take those funds and throw them at the mortgage so that I'm not paying it off over a period of 30 years.

The problem I see with investing in index funds (or whatever volatile thing you can think up) and using those contributions + principal to pay off the mortgage is that the balance might be down right around the time I want to pay off my house. I'd rather just pay it off and know it's going to be paid off by XX/XX/20XX date.

Possible middle ground: Open up a 2% CD and contribute to that instead of paying extra against the mortgage balance. Then, when the $$ in the CD is equal to the balance on your mortgage (and assuming CD maturity) , pay it off. This improves your ROI from mortgage payoff, right? If you've got a 4% mortgage and you pay it off with funds that earned 2% over X years, your ROI on the remaining balance you paid off is 6%.

Or is there something wrong with how I'm figuring that?

Man, sorry to jack this thread, which is supposed to be celebrating 401Killer's mortgage squashing :-/.

[runewell]

Possible middle ground: Open up a 2% CD and contribute to that instead of paying extra against the mortgage balance. Then, when the $$ in the CD is equal to the balance on your mortgage (and assuming CD maturity) , pay it off. This improves your ROI from mortgage payoff, right? If you've got a 4% mortgage and you pay it off with funds that earned 2% over X years, your ROI on the remaining balance you paid off is 6%.

Or is there something wrong with how I'm figuring that?

OMG no.  So rather than pay down $1,000 in mortgage debt which is going to cost $40 of interest next year, you want to put it in a CD and generate $20 instead.  Somehow that comes out to $60 total?

[401Killer]

Thanks guys!

I drained my e-fund a huge amount but obviously now without that payment (especially the extra I was putting down) recovery won't take more than a month or two.

What cracks me up, is that I've already started to look at the only loan I have right now in the exact same light as my mortgage. My auto loan... It's a rather heavy payment by anyone's standards ($515) and I've been rounding that up to $600/mo since I've had it for about a year now. I think of how crazy its going to be without a house payment, then consider how absolutely stupid it would be without that car payment...

[El_Viajero]

OMG no.  So rather than pay down $1,000 in mortgage debt which is going to cost $40 of interest next year, you want to put it in a CD and generate $20 instead.  Somehow that comes out to $60 total?

OMG I just sent you a PM to discuss. Tired of jacking this celebratory thread with my ramblings :-).

[RelaxationSpecialist]

YEEEEWWWWWWWW!!!!! CONGRATULATIONS!!! Way to take charge in quick fashion! Every mortgage payoff I read just inspires me to keep pushing and FIRE ASAP! Nice work!!