Should you pay off your Sudbury mortgage earlier than what it states on the loan’s contract? The simple answer is: yes! The earlier you can pay off your mortgage, the sooner you’ll be out of that huge amount of debt, and the sooner you can start using that money elsewhere. And while it may not have been a Toronto or Oakville mortgage that he recently paid off, Thomas Daigle of Massachusetts can tell you just how good it feels to pay off your mortgage early. He just paid his mortgage off in pennies.
That’s right. While we in Canada might be rolling our pennies so we can cash them in before they’re taken out of circulation in September, Mr. Daigle of the United States had a different reason – he was going to use them to pay off his mortgage. And that’s exactly what he did.
Mr. Daigle obtained his mortgage 35 years ago. Right after walking out of the lender’s office, Mr. Daigle and his wife spotted a penny on the ground. Picking it up and putting it in his pocket, Mr. Daigle joked with his wife that it was a sign – they’d pay off their mortgage using pennies. Over the years, he and his wife then started collecting pennies for their mortgage, rolling them up one at a time before adding them to their stockpile. And while it may have started off as a joke, the Daigles were the ones laughing all the way to the bank this week when they took all those rolls and paid off the $62,000 they had remaining on the mortgage – all in pennies.
It is currency and so, it had to be accepted. Even if it did take the tellers of the bank Mr. Daigle uses two whole days to unroll all those rolls of pennies.
Yes, this is a fluke story; and no, you probably won’t be able to pay off your mortgage using pennies. But it is possible to get out of debt sooner, and if you have the opportunity, it’s definitely one you should take.
But be careful. Most lenders have prepayment penalties, which could add up to quite a significant amount of money. Make sure you know what penalties your lender will charge and then compare them against paying your mortgage. If you’ll be saving money, pay your mortgage early. If not, keep paying for a few months until it’s truly worthwhile for you.
