Originally Posted by Partial
I'm not sure if a single guy making 40G could pay off a house in 5 years; but RG would, I think say, that you should wait until you have a more substantial downpayment then or buy a smaller house.
In terms of tax benefits, every penny you pay on the interest for the year and the annual property taxes you pay are tax deductible....aka...taken off your annual income for tax purposes.
RG, let me know if I'm slightly wrong on this but I'll throw out this example.
You make 40G per year; your taxes are 3G per year and Annual Interest on that mortgage is 9000. That would bring your taxable income down to 28G instead of 40G and good chance you'll get money back at tax time because you overpaid based on the 40G figure.