Quote:
Originally Posted by Road-Runner
After reading through hundred's of listings in the Villages over the last several years prior to buying, it seems like the bond is almost an afterthought compared to the listing price. Although "No Bond" is listed as a selling point I don't know that it registers with most buyers how much debt the average bond is on new homes until after they pick a home to buy.
With that in mind, would it be crazy to pay off the bond vs paying down the mortgage by an equivalent amount? We're still working and our house in Bradford will be a 2nd home for at least 2 more years. When we sell here we'll want to reduce our monthly costs to the minimum possible so planning on using all the proceeds from the sale to reduce our only remaining payment, the house.
Just curious if others have gone through the same decision process.
Thanks, Jim
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We bought an older home (2009) but still has the bond issue. We elected to pay down the mortgage rather than pay off the bond. From what we were told and has since been verified by our neighbors - villagers often move multiple times within TV for multiple reasons - one of our neighbors is on their 3rd house (they up-sized). Some folks down size as when a spouse passes or want to reduce living expenses (smaller mortgage). The person we bought from moved to a golf course view.
Additionally - paying down the mortgage reduces the monthly mortgage payment forever.
For this reason (possible moving), we did not pay off the bond as if we move, there is a high likelihood that there would be a bond on the "new" house and we'd be in the same situation again. But if we pay down the mortgage, that additional equity would always be there for us to use if we sell or if we need to use for something else.
HOWEVER, our thought process also included the fact that we will have the bond paid off in about 10 years which will reduce our overall expenses then.
When looking at homes (for the above reason), we did not consider the bond paid as a great selling point - more of a tie-breaker. But we were not looking at the new homes with new longer/higher bonds either. We are not sure if you would re-coup the bond in the selling price either.