15 year mortage vs. 30 year mortgage

[ncole1]

I usually think that you should only get a 15-year mortgage if you could qualify for it on the LOWER income of a two-income household, because otherwise the risk associated with the higher payment could backfire in the case of disability, divorce, job loss, etc.

[lottamoxie]

Originally Posted by paiste13

If you take the longer mortgage with a lower interest rate you can still pay additional principle and have it paid off in 15 years. We took out a 20 year loan and should have it paid off in 13 years with our extra payments. The big difference is if you have some emergency bills or expenses come up you can just pay the minimum of the 30 year mortgage and be okay. Once the crisis is over ramp up the payments again.

This is exactly my reasoning and I've already made use of it. I pay extra as I can to try to get this mortgage down to 15 years or less, but if there are months I can't then I don't. Best of both worlds without penalty.