My mortgage is 40 years.....It was part of a first time homebuyers program through Bank of America. Not sure it exists anymore, and it might have been something that was only offered in my area, but 40 years does happen. I say why not? How many people actually pay off their house? Typically people live in their house 5-7 years in my area before selling for whatever reason....usually upgrading due to equity built over the 5-7 years. During the good times houses in the SF bay area were appreciating 10-15% or even more per year so people were constantly flipping houses. Boy has that changed!

Bingo!

Banks don't care if you never pay off your loan and are indebt to them when you die as long as you pay them somthing every month it's like rent

touche....

I fully intend to pay off mine...

i dont trust 401k even though i have one, i figure the biggest bill most people have is thier rent/mortgage. I plan to eliminate that within the next 20 years and own my house. Then when i get old and toothless maybe i can get a reverse mortgage and they can pay me to infest the place with old man smell.

Yeah, that's a smart thing to do. It's hard to do that around here when the cost of houses are through the roof compared to most of the country.

This is a good movie to watch http://www.maxedoutmovie.com/

IOUSA I here was also pretty good.