What difference would it make to you being mortgage free?

[Hecketyheck]

Just that really. We’ve just paid off our mortgage due mainly to DH’s amazing money-management skills and my lack of spending. I’m feeling like I should be delighted with this but more feel like it doesn’t make a huge amount of difference - we now have to focus on a pension or something else equally tedious.

This is not a stealth boast or anything else like that and I’m sorry if people are struggling to live on a week-to-week basis.

We overpay on ours so that when it's gone we will actually notice the difference. Could have it paid off in our early 40s but, even with only one child, our house is far too small so we'll have to move at some point. Still hope to pay it off well before 50 by which point DD will be an adult and the spare cash will go on travelling during term time when it's cheaper! And adding more to the pot for DD obviously.

Mortgage free - well we would be saving £1200 a month so I would actually be able to become a SAHM and so also save on the £600 a month nursery fees for DS.

It would make a huge difference to us, I'd be able to spend more time with our daughter and family, which would be amazing. We're generally quite careful and try to overpay if and when we can, but it will still be taking a huge amount of our money for a long time yet.

I too wish I had more sensible with money when younger.
DH under enormous pressure in a job with little security.And I have been SAHM .
Going through marital issues and realised that even if I wanted to leave , very little assets to split.

I'm 60 and we've been mortgage free for about 8 years now: DH paid off the last bit when he moved in. Firstly it meant we could build up cash savings, secondly it meant that when my own business came to an end we could choose for me to work locally part time as a sort of pre-retirement phase. The house is also bigger than we will need in the future so we can downsize and use some of the equity as a pension so we will be even more comfortable in the future.

Ours will be gone next month, we’ve been overpaying for years so will be better off by about £3k a month. Going to finish the work on the house, go on holidays and start to save for a couple of investment properties probably overseas so we can rent them as holiday lets.

We’ve just remortgaged so gone backwards! Sigh. But we have a lovely life and can afford pretty much anything we want so actually that’s what it’s all about. Some people need to be mortgage free to have a bit of financial freedom but we have it anyway so it doesn’t mean that much to us.

Enjoying life is really all that matters either way.

It’d make about £550 a month to us. Will be paid off by the time the eldest turns 18 so that money will be handy for uni if he goes, or supporting him through training courses, apprenticeships, etc.

It will mostly mean diverting mortgage repayment amounts into other savings.

Dh’s Job is good, but vulnerable to economic shocks. So while he has always had a job, it’s not at all inconceivable that he would lose it (and worrying clouds on the economic horizon just now). He is also incredibly stressed and would like a chance to take a step back from his current role (still working but that means significant drop in salary).

I will always have my job unless I seriously f* it up. My salary will keep us, but not having to pay the Mortgage would take a significant strain off that and we could live, not in luxury, but in comfort rather than struggling if I had to cover mortgage and all ongoing household expenses.

So for the moment, the plan for spring 2020 is to start a new long term savings plan and put away a decent lump sum towards retirement. And also a smaller regular savings to have a nicer holiday - like maybe going to visit far flung family members or actually going skiing again (we did it once for my 40th).

I don’t think day to day life will change. Except for a sense of relief.

Security is the big one for me. I am going through a divorce and staying in the house so as not to cause further upheaval to DD but the mortgage is bigger than I would like it to be.

Realistically none as we’d probably move from the cheap area of the country we currently live in to the very expensive part of the country we want to live in, so we’d end up taking out another mortgage!
If we stayed put it would mean an extra £1000 a month, we’d probably save half and spend half.

It means that dh can retire in December at 58, and his Forces pension is enough for us to live on very nicely.

I'll be job hunting when we move back to the UK, but no mortgage means that there isn't an urgency attached to that.

Yes, I guess it’s the security aspect that is the main bonus and I do realise I’m very fortunate to be able to say that. We’ve had relatively cheap holidays up to now but our DC are still only 8 and 10 so I’m not sure that will change even now!

Mortgage free in all but name. I’ve kept £2k outstanding and extended the term to 20 years,making monthly payment £11 a month. The reason for this is to always have a cheap line of credit at hand. I’m on the nationwide BMR @ 2.75%, so I can always draw down my overpayments at anytime or pay the outstanding balance off with no penalty payments. I’m roughly £1340 better off a month. My 2 rules when it comes to saving money is never ever get involved in keeping up with the Jones’s and always make out to others that you are just about scrapping by.

For us, if we were mortgage free, we would be able for one or both of us to change jobs. Dh currently works shifts which isn’t ideal, so could find a Monday-Friday 9-5, (if such a thing exists now) and I could do something I actually want to do rather than a job that pays relatively well for what it is. We are currently overpaying to try to become mortgage free quicker.

BUT, we do have a good quality of life, holidays, days out, takeaways, social life. I wouldn’t consider over paying the mortgage if we weren’t having a bit of a life too. A good quality of life is more important to me as becoming mortgage free

We paid off our mortgage last year. I like the security of knowing that it's paid off, but it doesn't make a huge amount of difference on a daily basis. Just more money going into savings tbh.

I'll tell you next year when we've paid ours off! Though the plan is to stash most of what we no longer have to pay on the mortgage into our pension fund, so we won't notice much of a difference.

We thought it would make a huge difference (£800 a month)but goodness knows where that money goes now as we don't seem to be any better off ! we are helping one son through Uni though and have 3 other teenagers.

Our mortgage is £2k a month. Psychologically, I’d love to have it paid off as I think I’d feel a lot more relaxed.

Financially though, it doesn’t make much of a difference. We save a lot and the mortgage payment is very manageable. If we didn’t have it, we’d save more but don’t need to currently.

We added to savings and investments and have had many lovely hols, inc taking a month off work about 8 years ago to travel round America.

We’d be £1,800 a month better off!
But it’s not a financial burden for us, we overpay it by £500 a month and I think we’ve got about 7 years to go so I’ll be mortgage free by the time I’m 41.
Realistically, the money will be invested elsewhere so day to day it won’t really make a difference but hopefully longer term it will equate to substantial house deposits for the dc, pension funds, all kinds of really boring but (imo) essential things.