should we just pay off tye 52 k left on our mortgage if we can?

[KierkegaardGroupie]

We have a property we let out in Brighton....We have 52 k left on it...it is worth about 160 k...We rent it out as we live overseas where we rent a family home.
We pay 220 pounds interest a month on that 52k loan. We make very little on the 52 k...so it seems obvious to me we just use my savings to pay off this flat my husbAnd bought ...it is in his name. But am I missing something? We may well sell that flat in the next few years to release equity to buy in the U.S.....We rent a family home we love here but probably should buy as we, plan on staying in the U.S. and live in an expensive city...350 k for a modest family home near good schools so similar to London. We would still have some savings left...say 20k in the uk if anything needed doing on that Brighton property.

It seems obvious if you are, paying 5 percent to borrow 52 k and have 52 k in an account getting 1 percent....you pay your loan off.
Any savvy financial people able to input on this? It means we cannot buy in the U.S.....as that money is our deposit for a house here....my feeling is Brighton is a safe market...the property will most likely go up in value...in the next few years we could hang onto it for.

Something I do not understand here is you can lock in interest rate for thirty years
..like 3 per cent. How us that even possible...I do not understand.so you know your home payment always stays the same or goes down.

Yep, that's right.

The lender buys the money from a big finance firm, then offers to lend it out at a certain rate. As they have already bought it and know what they paid for it, they know how much they need to charge to make their profit. Sometimes there are penalties for ending a mortgage early as they don't get to charge you the full interest.

Worth knowing as we do hope to put all extra money on the mortgage so we better check for that kicks. Thank you.
So why does it not work like that in the UK?

It does on fixed rate mortgages. Banking is different in the UK. Many mortgage lenders are banks and have their own supply of money so can do variable rate. In the US more mortgage companies are not banks so buy in their funds and then lend on at a profit.

May seem a way off but do check the right to remain in US of your children once they reach 21.

May influence your decision to retain property in UK depending on your own immigration status if they will not qualify to remain.

Also property in Brighton has increased in value between 8-10% in last year ...is one crazy prediction that will rise another 40% in value between now and 2019...as this is UK property market they may be right! As previous posters said if you change your mind in next few years then it can be extremely hard to re-enter housing market here.