[Rick Lee]

Bob, another way to do it is to make one extra P&I payment per year. You just take your regular payment, divide it by 12 and add that much to each month's payment. That will make a 30 yr. loan into a 23 yr. loan, saving you 84 months of payments. 15 yr. mortgages have better rates, but the minimum payment can sting. Actually, you can even get an interest-only or even option ARM loan and just make big principle payments each month. If you're disciplined and smart about it, some of those exotic products can be very good for you. The problem is that a lot of very unsophisticated people get sucked into them by the low min. payment and then get upside down with the negative amortization.