Paying off the mortgage

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Is it your goal to be mortgage free? If yes, why? If not, why not?

I always thought that was the point...get a mortgage, pay it off as quickly as you're able, be mortgage free. Boom. But quite a few times recently people have said 'Why are you so keen to pay off your mortgage?' or 'Don't be in such a rush* to pay it off'.

Is paying it off not the point?

*wouldn't say I'm in a rush fyi, we currently have a 25 year term and are looking at options for overpaying to bring that down to 15 years. So that we'll have more disposable income in our 50's rather than 60+, and so that we'll have options to decrease payments/extend the term when/if DC go to uni and we need more funds.

If you have something better to do with the spare cash eg invest in a business or
Other property then do that. If not then pay it off quickly

Some people like me are not good at saving so overpaying a mortgage is a good way to force save.

I’ve paid a few off early, sold, downsized and taken out another mortgage and kept money back to invest.

Mortgage free currently. Early retired now too at 50 but can still dip in and out of work.

Will downsize when DS finishes uni give him a chunk and then buy somewhere smaller and cheaper.

Not ruled out getting a mortgage again depends how I feel.

We had an offset mortgage early on and paid off a 25 yr term in 17 yrs through regular monthly overpayment to our savings. It helped that we never overextended ourselves so never had a massive mortgage in relation to income. During that period, I experienced redundancy which overlapped with DH's and we were extremely glad that we had a flexible offset savings pot to access that year. Experience of redundancy definitely shaped our attitude to seek financial freedom from mortgage debt/have the choice to stop working before we're 60 and still enjoy a good lifestyle.

It’s not just the tax relief, it’s the money in your 20s being worth more in the pension than in your 40s and the money in your pension in your 30s being worth more than in your 40s and 50s

you can’t turn the clock back, investment s work better with time & money not just money

if you put away £100 a month for 25 years @5% you end up with £59,999 invested £30000

if you put away £300 for 10 years @5% you end up with £46749 invested £36000

so by paying off your mortgage and then putting money into a pension may not be the best way to go about things

paying some of your surplus into a pension and some surplus into a pension maybe a financially better option

I tend to view my mortgage as 'rent that I eventually get to stop paying (and that is also lots cheaper than actually renting would be)'. So yes, I have an eye to the thing being paid off eventually - and I like the idea of overpaying to save on interest overall. However, my finances don't have a huge amount of wiggle room in them - I'm doing fine and certainly not struggling to afford essentials, but there's a finite amount left to play with, and other things I need to put it towards (some upcoming building maintenance that really needs sorting, for instance - not things that can wait for the 5+ years it would take to pay off the mortgage at even the most relentless pace possible). I'm certainly not trotting off on regular holidays. On balance, then, I'm content that the mortgage will eventually come to its natural end - sure, if I find myself in the position to overpay a bit then I likely will, but it's just not really workable to push it more than that.

That makes so much sense!

My cousin paid his off in 13 years. Lived very frugally, each time he had to remortgage he paid off another big chunk. Can now stack money away.

I've tried to do a balance between the two. Life is for living but once in mortgage free in a few years, I'll be able to do much more. I've always just had a small overpayment into each new deal, taking a year or two off each time. It's taken a 30 year mortgage down to around 22.

They are different lifestyle choices, live for today or save for a good life later. Perhaps the more despondent a society becomes the less likely they are to save toward their future, but as for me, of course I may not live to see my hard work pay off, but if I do I will be thrilled and that to me is worth all the little holidays I've not taken.

Yeah. To add to that. I find today easier knowing that tomorrow is provided for.

My DH and I prioritised paying extra money into pensions to get tax relief and to give the contributions years to grow. This worked for us, we then used some of the 25% pension tax free amount to clear our mortgage .
This decision really paid off as we were able to retire young and have no mortgage. It’s all about the growth with pensions so it didn’t make sense to pay the mortgage earlier and then start extra pension contributions when we were mortgage free.
We even switched to interest only a few times or did part and part knowing as soon as we were 55 we could either use pension money to clear the mortgage or downsize our house.

I want to pay off the mortgage to simplify our finances. Plus I want to protect DH. We are late 50s.

Currently house and mortgage are in my name only (this was for logistical reasons). Once the mortgage is paid off I will transfer the house into joint names.

Over the last few years every few months I have saved up a few thousand and thrown that at the mortgage. We are in the tail end of our mortgage so paying significantly more capital than interest. Now I just want it done.

This is the first time in our lives we have felt comfortably off. There was huge comfort when we got to the point where if needs be we could sell the house, downsize slightly and be mortgage free.

We did but when housing was much cheaper, we ended up paying off our mortgage without penalty after only 5 years as we had an investment do very well. This was roughly 2004 but was the best bit of financial luck we have ever had. So we have had 20 years of no housing costs which had a major snowball effect on our finances. We are now lucky enough to be able to retire early by the time we are both 58.

I’m not in a rush to pay off the mortgage now - am in the expensive childcare years and we have fixed at a low rate until 2027 - so I’ve been focusing on my pension and ISAs for now.

When we come to remortgage i might use my ISA savings to pay down a chunk but equally might keep it as is with a view to downsizing to release equity or reduce the mortgage when we are older instead. Whilst the peace of mind of being mortgage free would be great, the mortgage (London) is so massive that it would mean a serious hit to our quality of life to pay it down aggressively.

I can get 40% tax relief on pension contributions, or pay more off a 1.5% interest small mortgage. For my circumstances, it makes sense to do the pension.

I am hoping to get reasonably close to mortgage free oct 2025 when my fix ends

I have used previous overpayments to go interest only (as I overpaid I can now underpay) and am putting £1500 a month into monthly savers getting between 5 and 7% rather than the 2.24% my mortgage is fixed at

Will pay lump sum in when fix finishes and hopefully I won't then be too far away.

On the home stretch. I'm 41 and husband 46.

I think mortgages are good debt, happy to just pay off the interest on mine and invest the surplus elsewhere.

Hitting mortgage free js sensible, you can then put the equivalent into your pension plus tax relief and retire earlier. You can reduce that payment if you need to. For us it meant my wife could stop work to raise the kids. Also means you pay less for your home overall (overpaying), so I wouldn't have it any other way. I'm 40, wife 39.

I'm not sure who these people are who are telling you not to overpay your mortgage. If you can afford to it is a really good thing to do. Play around with the figures and see just how much you save.

As previous pps have said though, you have to find a balance that works for you. I wouldn't deprive myself of any holiday for 15 years in order to pay it off early, for example, as holidays are important to me - but then, I holiday quite a lot in the UK, and don't spend the thousands that some people do. Different things are important to different people. Some would rather work PT when the dc are young, which means less £ to throw at the mortgage each month. But some would make savings in other areas.

Yes I'd want the security that comes with being mortgage free, no one can then take your home off you. I over paid for years and that gave me the financial security to be able to take payment breaks if needed, for times such as job loss, redundancy or ill health. It was also astounding that by paying even £50 to £100 a month the term dropped dramatically.

No because the house we're in just now isn't the house we'll be in forever. It's a self build so there's a decent amount of equity already purely down to build cost vs value. Selling to downsize later in life will clear the mortgage & provide funds to buy a property. No rush to pay it off before then, would rather have as much free each month as possible to enjoy our lives. I do understand why some people don't think like this though.