I Spent Time, Energy, and $190… to Save $71

Okay, so the title is a little misleading.

I paid $190 once to save about $71 every month for the next 27 years.

I may be crazy, but I’ve always felt like a sucker for paying PMI.

I know it’s a tiny percentage of my monthly mortgage payment. I know it’s not the biggest expense in my budget. But once I learned what PMI was, I always felt like I was being cheated.

And I always told myself:

“I’ll get that removed as soon as I can.”

Well, I’d been paying my mortgage for a few years, watching the value of my house climb on Redfin and Zillow. A few months ago, I finally ran the numbers.

And they worked.

I had reached what I believed was 20% equity in the house.

I was excited.

I was ready to get that PMI removed.

That was money back in my wallet every month.

I researched what I needed to do and sent my lender an email asking if I could have my PMI removed.

They responded with an official letter explaining the steps I needed to take.

First, I needed to officially request an appraisal.

Second, I needed to pay a $190 fee.

And then I read the fine print.

Because I hadn't made any major renovations, I would need to have 25% equity, not 20%.

My heart sank.

My math had me at 25% equity, and I felt pretty confident I had enough to clear the 20% requirement.

But 25%?

I might just miss it.

Suddenly, my sure thing had turned into a gamble.

And $190 seemed like a lot of money to gamble.

So I researched the best ways to get a high appraisal. I made a list of things I could do to prepare the house. I asked my wife for probably the 100th time:

“Do you think we should just do it, or wait a few more months and pay the mortgage down a little further?”

She said:

“Just do it.”

So I did.

The next day, I paid the $190 and waited for the appraiser to contact me.

We scheduled the appointment about a week out.

During that week, I cleaned.

I made lists of improvements we'd made to the house.

I Googled what appraisers look for.

And, naturally, I checked Redfin and Zillow every day to see if the value of my house had gone up.

The morning of the appraisal, I woke up early and mowed the lawn.

Because apparently, that's who I am now.

When the appraiser showed up, she was at the house for approximately 15 minutes.

I pointed out the cabinets we'd installed. I showed her the new white vinyl fence in the backyard. I took her around the house while she took pictures.

And then she left.

That was it.

I immediately opened Redfin.

And, of course, the website had just dropped my home's estimated value by a few thousand dollars.

“Damn.”

I thought.

“I'm not going to hit it. I should have waited another six months.”

But then I calmed down.

And I told myself what I'd told myself about a hundred times during this whole process:

$190 is a perfectly reasonable price to find out how close I am to lowering my mortgage payment by $71.

So I waited.

And checked my mortgage account.

Every day.

For several days.

Then, at the end of the week, I got an email.

I had been approved.

I still don't know exactly what the house appraised for.

And honestly, at that point, I didn't really care.

I was thrilled.

Because this wasn't really about putting an extra $71 in my pocket every month.

It was about something bigger.

If my family ever goes through a financial emergency, it will now cost us about $70 less every month to keep a roof over our heads.

That's what financial security means to me.

It's not always about making more money.

Sometimes it's about making the things you have to pay cost a little less.

It's about finding the little leaks in your financial life and plugging them.

And sometimes it means spending $190, stressing about an appraisal for a week, mowing your lawn at 7 a.m., and obsessively checking your mortgage account...

...to save $71 a month.

That's not going to make me rich.

But it permanently strengthened my family's financial shield.

Just a tiny bit.

But strengthened nonetheless.