<prompt> Human: Background: Age: 28Home purchased August 2016 - 1 bed 1 bath condo purchased at 180,000.Mortgage: 20 down-payment, with 0 points, 10-year conventional loan of 144,000 at interest rate of 2.75, APR of 2.79.I currently have 131k left on the loanOther info:Income: 157-160k a year; I contribute 18k a year to my 401k, and 1900 a year to my HSA.Expenditures: Average credit card spending of 400 or so a month, which includes my internet and phone bill. Monthly mortgage payment is 1600, and HOA fee is 500 month. I save about 60 of my take-home pay into my savings account, and I had accumulated 75k in my savings in the past 9 months.Current 401k: 61,000 - my company has transitioned over to Fidelity.Tax-advantaged accounts: 5.3k in a traditional IRA with Vanguard - Total International Stock Index, 6k in a Roth IRA - Emerging Stock Markets Index that I back-doored into last year.Non-tax advantaged accounts: 11k at Vanguard Total Stock index fund.Other debts: NoneIm nervous about investing more money into my brokerage accounts at Vanguard at this time, which is why I thought paying off the mortgage would be a safer bet.Ultimate goal is to be completely debt free and financially-independent by 40.Did I just make a mistake in writing a check to attempt the paying off half the principal for my mortgage early with this 71k check? Should I tear up that check and invest that money instead? What would you do?Assistant: For all the people saying to invest, Ill be the counter argument to that. Sure, you could invest, and considering how low your interest rate is, you could easily grow those funds at a faster rate, than you save interest. That being said, there is a huge weight many people feel on their back when they have a debt, and removing that weight is more mentally freeing and worth more than the gains of an investment account. Who are you? What is your preference? From a growth perspecting, investing the money is the way to go, but with a goal of financial independence by 40, pay it down. To take it one step further, you reduce your principal by 50, i would then request your bank to re-amortize the loan. Usually for a small fee My bank charges 200, they will re-do your payment schedule over the remainder of the term. This will drastically reduce your monthly mortgage payment, you can then take that difference and slowly invest it. Remove a bulk of your outstanding debt, and increase your investments over the next few years, its a strong feeling of accomplishment. Human: Who are you? What is your preference? Someone who is very risk-averse.Someone know has heard all the repeated advice of Do NOT try and time the market, but still looks at the SP reaching an all time high and thinks to himself, yeah I dont know if I should jump in at this time...And also someone who DOES desperately want to invest and be able live off the interest by the time I reach 40, but is too ambivalent about how to go about attaining that goal that I may be sabotaging myself with going down the safest, but least profitable route of paying off the principal on my mortgage.  <response>: Not to discount doing what you are doing as I think paying off the loan would be great, but the SP is almost always at or near an all time high, so its not really relevant. 