We’ve recently heard proposals about a 50-year mortgage term here in the US.

Unsurprisingly, most experts think this is a very bad idea as it will do nothing to lower home prices (and if anything, as I’ll try to prove below, it will likely raise prices).

That said, in a vacuum where I was looking to buy a home and I was given the option to get a 50-year mortgage for only a small increase in the interest rate, I would do it in a heartbeat.

I love the flexibility of a lower payment where I always can pay extra principal and amortize the mortgage much more quickly on my own terms.

I also know that it’s statistically unlikely that I’ll live in the house anywhere near 30-50 years, so I’m really just managing my monthly payments and I want to do whatever I can to lower that payment.

But in general, I think 50-year mortgages are bad for society because they will likely raise home prices and an even smaller fraction of your monthly payment will go to pay down principal.

So, this is another interesting societal…