04-01-2015, 04:45 PM
It seems like a lifetime ago since my wife and I decided to take the plunge and purchase a home. I do remember we didn't qualify for a first time home buyers loan because we had saved to much money. The guy handling our loan offered some advise which was to invest the money we had accumulated for a down payment which was close to 20 thousand. I was in my mid twenties at the time and my investment knowledge was limited at best. I opted to plow every possible penny into reducing our mortgage(5.4%interest back then) and came up with a five year plan to do so. It ended up taking 7 years but since 2006 we have been mortgage free. I remember that we were so excited to make that final payment that we literally only had $300 dollars in the bank after we wrote the check. Probably one of the more insanely stupid things I have ever done but it worked out. We ended up buying a brand new car that year and paid it off a year later. Since that day we have been debt free and there is no better feeling. A couple of weeks ago we traded off that car and bought another brand new car. This time we paid cash which felt good. Although it was hard to part with has,csx, and some pepsis shares to pay for it, my dividend income was surprisingly unaffected. For me piece of mind is king and now I can focus on my new 14 year plan. Retirement