House Mortgage -- Countdown

[amarowsky]

Down to 57k/75K on mortgage.

[breathemusic]

Ended up getting $1200 back from overpayment on my escrow account last year (just bought last year in April) and it adjustment my monthly mortgage payment down by almost $100. It's the little things

In other news, it was painful to see that after paying a mortgage for not even a full year, my tax documents showed that I paid $19k in interest... sigh.

[Jluke]

January 2018 (1st payment): $2940 ($2000 extra)
Balance: $197,705

March 2018 (3rd payment): $196,580

Had I not put any extra (2000+260+260 so far), my balance would be $199,113 after 3 payments.

[markr867]

February 2018
Mortgage payment: #11 of 339
Extra applied to principal: $1,056.96
Ending balance: $290,040.63

After only 11 months of payments, we've reduced our total payments from 360 to 339. We're on track to pay this 30 year mortgage in 13 years!

[Gailete]

As of today, both loans on our rental property are paid off as well as finishing paying the fire insurance payments for the rest of the year for the rental property! Happy dance for me. Our tenant tends to be late every month with the rent so this is a huge stress reliever, as now we have more freedom to kick him out or at least, I'm not going to have to worry about when the money is coming to pay on the loans.

Paid extra on our house mortgage as well. Just was checking out the mortgage calculators to see what is a conceivable mortgage payoff. Last week I decided that I want to 'retire' when I turn 70 and was hoping to be able to have the house paid off by then, but with other bills to pay along with the mortgage (using the rent money that was going into the rental loans). I looks like it may take us a year after that to get the morgage paid off, but that depends on how things go for the next couple years of paying off other bills as well. Even so it would get the mortgage paid off 4 years early, but hope to do it quicker than that. Currently have $63885 to go.

[greenskeeper]

$1200 additional principal for March

almost down to 5 digits on the mortgage remaining

[snafu]

tinasingh, Welcome to SA. I don't know how long you've had your home but mortgage payment which includes principal, interest, taxes, and possibly insurance [homeowner & PMI if applicable] is usually significant. I suggest you create a simple spreadsheet to fully understand how your monthly payments are allocated.

In our 1st year as homeowners, I was so shocked by how little of our monthly payment went to principal, I chose to add an extra amount directly to principal. It made a huge difference. Ultimately, it resulted in my paying off a 30 yr mortgage in about 13 years. What was really important was the sum avoided in interest. It was staggering.

I still have to pay municipal tax and homeowner's insurance but I was able to contribute the sum in principal and interest to our retirement fund as similar to automatic withdrawal of mortgage, painlessly.

[Gailete]

tinasingh, Welcome to SA. I don't know how long you've had your home but mortgage payment which includes principal, interest, taxes, and possibly insurance [homeowner & PMI if applicable] is usually significant. I suggest you create a simple spreadsheet to fully understand how your monthly payments are allocated.

In our 1st year as homeowners, I was so shocked by how little of our monthly payment went to principal, I chose to add an extra amount directly to principal. It made a huge difference. Ultimately, it resulted in my paying off a 30 yr mortgage in about 13 years. What was really important was the sum avoided in interest. It was staggering.

I still have to pay municipal tax and homeowner's insurance but I was able to contribute the sum in principal and interest to our retirement fund as similar to automatic withdrawal of mortgage, painlessly.

Your post made me want to calculate our home loan pay off if I paid the amount each month we are committed to $648.65 and what the difference it would make if I rounded the payment up to $650. I would pay the loan off at least a month early. If I could pay half the loan every two weeks, I should be able to pay it off even 4-5 months quicker, and that isn't adding anything extra other than rounding up to $650!

I talk a lot about rounding up when making payments with interest, and just that little calculation of paying $1.35 extra each month (and the math is simpler as well) can make a month difference in pay off dates. Wish I had done that from the beginning of the loan.

Because I have over the last year or so made extra larger payments almost all the calculators tried to tell me that my monthly payment would be $640. Any time you can add in some extra is going to make a difference at the back end of the loan. Just because some here making 6 figures are able to add large amounts extra on to their loans, doesn’t mean that any extra those of us with a lot lower income can’t pay extra as well. ��

[disneysteve]

Just because some here making 6 figures are able to add large amounts extra on to their loans, doesn’t mean that any extra those of us with a lot lower income can’t pay extra as well. ��

Very true. Every little bit helps even if it's just rounding up to the nearest $5. Do whatever you can do.

Our payment (PITI) is $1,327.27. For years, I've rounded it up to $1,400.00, so an extra $72.73/month. The actual mortgage payment is $658.07. That means that every 9 months, I've made one extra mortgage payment. This has shaved a great deal of time off of the repayment schedule.

[Gailete]

Very true. Every little bit helps even if it's just rounding up to the nearest $5. Do whatever you can do.

Our payment (PITI) is $1,327.27. For years, I've rounded it up to $1,400.00, so an extra $72.73/month. The actual mortgage payment is $658.07. That means that every 9 months, I've made one extra mortgage payment. This has shaved a great deal of time off of the repayment schedule.

Proves even more that every little bit helps. The last time I got gas the attendent and I got talking about the cost of gas over the years and then cigarettes (I don't smoke) so I asked him how much they were going for. Apprently some generic brand in PA is around $5/pack. The kind he smokes runs over $8/pack. That is $240 he is literally burning up each month or $3K/year. If he has a mortgage think how much less he would owe if he could dump that extra $240/month onto the mortgage or else just $50-100 and put the rest toward those things that they 'can't afford'.

I think this is the sort of thing that we can help people with on this forum. Not that many mention that they smoke so we never see it in their budget, but it could account for the big gap at times between take home and expenses, especially if both the couple smoke. Not that we are here to help people stop smoking, but to help them understand that it is undermining their entire fiscal lives. I have never felt compelled to smoke but at times I have contemplated buying a pack of the nasty cheap ones. We had a guy around town that collected any cigarette butt he saw that he could get a puff or two from, he literally picked them off the street, sidewalks, everywhere and smoked them! He had some mental health issues, but I wondered if giving him a whole pack would keep him from picking them up off the street. I can't hardly imagine the germs he was getting.

[amarowsky]

as of 3/1/18 I'm down to $56.1/75K on my house.

Haven't been much paying extra for a while (made some extra payments towards investment property instead).

I think I am going to round up again, my escrow re-adjusted to make my monthly payment increase to ~$820, so I think I'll start rounding up to $850, maybe even $900.

Investment property is ~89k/100k.
(my inherited home I share w/ my bro. Value is @ 185k, and we rent for 1.25k/mo)

[Jluke]

March 2018 (3rd payment): $196,580

Had I not put any extra (2000+260+260 so far), my balance would be $199,113 after 3 payments.

Apr 2018: $194,500

extra $1774 - took some of my bonus for the extra.

goal is to stay on track with just the $260 extra/month for the rest of 2018. I'll probably fail at some point, again.

I think having paid off a mortgage of a similar amount before (and really understanding an amortization schedule) makes this seem less daunting.

[Randomsaver]

Hi to all my friends here. Just dropping by. Currently renting. I'll start again mid-year and hope to finish in 6 years.

[JoeP]

5900 left! So:

While we will be celebrating, we will be under heavy pressure to pay for 2 college educations. So:

[Gailete]

Made my latest mortgage payment on Wed. plus extra. Today I went to the web and found a place that would let me download an amortization schedule so I will know where I am at in terms of early payoff.

After this last payment, we are at $63504.40 (no taxes of insurance in the loan). Looked up how we are doing on the pay off and it looks as if we are about 3 1/2 payments ahead since I started paying extra. have less than 12 years to go, but I want it paid off if at all possible by a lot sooner. This schedule also shows what paying every two weeks can save so I may have to figure out how to do that. If I had been doing it for the whole loan, we would have saved 36 months of payments. With the schedule I can now track payments and how things are doing.