re: Another question regarding paying down your mortgage...

Another way to look at this is to ask yourself "if I bought this house 30 years ago and did the same, where would I be"? The Average house in 1982 was 80k, with an average mortgage payment of $ 300/month. At today's mortgage rate, an extra payment in the begining could save you $1200 at the end of the mortgage (2012). Remember that a gallon of gas was around a dollar in '82 (and even cheaper in the mid 90's). And if you invested the money in the S+P 500, you'd have made >2000% from October '82 to October '12.