Mark Moss questions whether you truly own your home when property taxes, insurance, utilities, and maintenance never stop. A client wants to pay off her mortgage for security, but Moss argues that eliminating the debt alone doesn't solve the problem.
The old question is, should I pay off my house early or should I invest? And the question really comes down to what are you trying to achieve? And so I was working with a coaching client yesterday and he was telling me how he wanted to pay off his house. And I asked him why. And he said, because I feel like I just want to own it. It's a security thing. And I asked him, but do you ever really own it? Because if you stop making payments, they're going to come take it from you. As a matter of fact, there's about 5 payments that you have to make every single month if you want the house. Your mortgage is one, but then you have property taxes, you have insurance, utilities, maintenance. You have to pay take all those. So if you pay off one but you still have 4 other payments, does that really bring you security?
