I don’t need to define one meaning for all waves. It depends! Just like all variable situations, just like the one being discussed here.Ivygirl wrote: ↑Sat Apr 16, 2022 7:12 amMaybe it is about waves. What do you think of when you think of a really big wave? Is it something you ride on a surfboard, for thrills amid blue skies and foam, in invulnerability? Or is it something that would drown you, coming at you relentlessly one after the other, as you swim for dear life and pray your arms and legs and breath don't fail?mbasherp wrote: ↑Fri Apr 15, 2022 12:51 pmBut even more resilient than a paid off home is the wisely non-attached “home is where the heart is” philosophy. Otherwise we may become possessed by our possessions.HMSVictory wrote: ↑Fri Apr 15, 2022 12:22 pmWell said. My home is not an option I look to leverage to invest the proceeds somewhere else.Ivygirl wrote: ↑Sun Mar 27, 2022 7:12 am
If "home" means your refuge, the place you have made your own, the place your children can always come back to, the edifice that secures your place in the world whose borders you would defend, the place that everything you love is there - a mortgage is a worry and an irritant and best gone ASAP.
Most people are the second kind, which is why Realtors cynically call every thing they sell a "home" and not a "house" which would be more accurate.
I think almost everyone is the second kind but some people want to fool themselves they are "outsmarting", "leveraging" or "optimizing" the market and interest rates by borrowing to invest elsewhere. Same kind of smarter than the average bear stuff lead to the GFC of 2007-2009.
The GFC was much more about really dumb loans to people that shouldn’t have them, not differing opinions on how to have shelter.
Almost everyone is the second kind. Really. We are born naked and with nothing and we struggle upward from there. Waves don't look like a beach vacation to most of us.
"Home is where the heart is" is sometimes said to mean one doesn't need a home, that one's affections are independent of place. Homes hold our affections. They also hold what we have struggled for and value, the door that no one else has a key to, the comfortable bed we bought after years of sleeping on the floor, the nice rain jacket in the coat closet instead of the one that was shedding plastic and looked like a reject from Columbo. Home is the cherry tree I planted in its third year and loaded with little cherries.
The idea of a financial corporation being a majority stakeholder in my home is a worry and an irritant. I do not want them to have a key to my home. I think most people are like me. I think most people have a dread of waves, have had more than enough of them, and don't care to ride. We want to own our homes.
We seem to be on opposite ends of a spectrum. I am in favor of less attachment to things as a way to happiness. Exploring which way is better is definitely outside the scope of this thread.
Your closing paragraph is interesting though. I don’t know what kind of mortgage you’ve signed but I’ve never had any bank be a majority stakeholder in my home. They have no say in my home whatsoever; they merely lent me money based on my ownership of the home which allows them recourse if I break my end of the deal. I would want the same thing if I loaned someone money.
I own it. I have the keys. They offered me money at terms which are now better than even the US government gets and no, I have no intention of doing them a favor by paying them back earlier than agreed.