[MontaniSemperLiberi]

From Dave Ramsey,

"It is wise to keep my home mortgage to get the tax deduction."

Let's do the math. If you have a home with a payment of $900, and the interest portion is $830 per month, you have paid around $10,000 in interest that year, which creates a tax deduction. If, instead, you have a debt-free home, you would in fact lose the tax deduction, so the myth says keep your home mortgaged because of tax advantages.

If you don't have a $10,000 tax deduction and you're in a 30% tax bracket, you will have to pay $3,000 in taxes on that $10,000. According to the math, we should send $10,000 in interest to the bank so we don't have to send $3,000 in taxes to the IRS. Personally, I think I will live debt-free and not make a $10,000 trade for $3,000.

[Pearls Before Swine]

Re post 8:

I’m not sure what your point is. If you have the means to buy a home as opposed to borrowing the money, it usually makes sense to do so. However, most homeowners don’t have that choice, as evidenced by how many homes have mortgages.

So, given that money is going to be borrowed by most people, it follows that making the cost of borrowing more expensive is going to hurt home values.