This is the problem I have as well. My house is worth 3x what I paid for it, and my monthly payments are… let’s just say I can’t rent a 1br shithole for what I pay monthly for 1500 sqft 3bd 2bath.. (which is also a shithole but it’s mine.)

Even if I sell for the 3x, everything else went up proportionally -and- interest is much higher than the 3.18% rate I got, so I’d be much further behind, and it would be a lateral move, to boot, not an upgrade. Trading the problems I’m aware of for problems I’m not aware of, and paying exorbitantly for the privilege.

Instead, I’m stuck here. Either convince my friend to move in with me, which she’s nearly sold on already, or buying a second property and renting this one out to cover the difference, which I’d rather not do. I hope she takes me up on moving in, not because I need help with the bills, I don’t and don’t really want a roommate, but because she does (she makes barely more than I do, but pays almost 5x as much every month for a quarter of the space in a major metro area rental - she could make half her current wage here and still come out well ahead, but she’d probably make almost the same amount).

It’s being willed to her if I die before her (single, no kids, no plan to change either of those), so anything she puts into improvement she benefits from now and later, even if she moves out. Win-win, and really the only way I’ve found to make this whole thing work decently.

But like, let's say you paid 200k, paid off 50k, and now it's worth 600k.

You sell, pay 150k to the bank, and use 450k to pay on another 600k house.

You're new mortgage is for 150k.

I just don't get where this came from:

At today’s rates I’d pay nearly 1.4 million over the life of the loan

Because you're talking about a whole 600k loan. Which makes zero sense given what you're saying