re: When to pay off the mortgage

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Never, unless your interest rate is retarded.

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Anything 4% and up, pay off with the quickness

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I think the sweet spot still depends on where you are in the amortization schedule and depends on what you are sacrificing with other retirement savings and debt issues.

I usually hate the idea of paying down a mortgage instead of making their maximum IRA and 401k contributions.

Whether you have a high or a low interest rate the biggest benefit is paying down the first 10 or 20% or principal- as long as you are staying there for five or ten more years. Because the amount of your future mortgage payments that is lost to interest decreases dramatically (and when you check out the schedule that can mean you accrued many thousands of dollars more in equity). Is that worth doing? Probably need to look at the schedule.

If you aren't staying long enough to see those savings I don't see how it would. If you haven't maxed out retirement savings that's likely a big mistake (especially younger people lose out on the most valuable compounding years).

The live debt free people do have a point when it comes to stress. If you go full Dave Ramsey and then advance your discretionary investments after you kill the debt you do have more safety nets. That's an "eventually" goal for most people.