Hello everyone, First time poster here. I (36) am a kind of a newbie as far as personal finance goes. I've always been conscious about my money/spending but I didn't have a budget or a proper plan. For context, I just bought a house and as the title suggests, I'm feeling conflicted about what to put money towards next. Now that I've saved up for the down payment to get a mortgage and moved in (YAY), I want to continue to build on this momentum. The way I see it (and please correct me if I'm wrong), I could invest in equity funds that are earning interest annually or contribute those extra dollars towards my mortgage each month to pay it down faster. From a purely mathematical standpoint, doesn't it make sense to allocate all of my 15% monthly budget that was previously dedicated towards saving for a down payment towards my brokerage account? Here's my math: My mortgage interest rate is 7.625%. For conservative math, I'll pretend that I would solely purchase S&P500 every month. According to the Goggle, "over the last 20 years, the S&P 500 has delivered an annualized return of approximately 11% to 11.8%" I'll use 11% for extra conservative math. So my monkey brain says, "11% minus 7.625% equals 3.375% faster net "growth" by investing 15% of my monthly income in the S&P rather than paying my mortgage faster." Please help me out here. I recognize that this may be disingenuously simplistic. I'm just trying to wrap my head around this conceptually. Please don't pull any punches! If you think I'm a big dummy poo poo brain for even thinking of this, please tell me so. tldr: I want to take 15% of my net monthly income and put it towards my mortgage, invest it, or some combination thereof. My math says invest it all since the most conservative returns rate is higher than the interest of my mortgage. Thanks in advance!

For starters, my husband (38) and I (37) keep our finances completely separate. This is our set up and it works for us, we have no desire to change. He pays the mortgage, his vehicle, and insurances. I pay monthly bills, my vehicle, home repairs, kids sports, etc. We split food based on who has the time to go to the store and what we need. My vehicle has $23k left, 3.99% interest, minimum payment $820. I pay $500 every 2 weeks. Last summer we did over $60k in home repairs and upfits (basement, install 4 mini splits). I have $6k left on the AC (12 month 0% financing will be over in a few days, so I need to to pay from savings or HELOC). I have $15k left on the HELOC for the basement at 5.75%. Minimum payment 1% of balance. I pay $500 a month. We currently rent a water softener (came with the house that way). I have contractors coming out to quote buying and installing a new system. We have a well with extremely high iron and hard water. The softener is needed, I just don't want to pay the monthly rental fee anymore. As far as savings: HYSA: $13k (3.1%, has been dropping this year) - I add $500 every 2 weeks. 3 CD's (3.5-4%): $32k maturing Sept 2026, $10.5k maturing August 2026, and another $10.5k maturing Dec 2026. Robinhood: $6k (in VOO, Apple and Tesla.) Not actively contributing. Coinbase: $30k. Not actively contributing. Retirement: $131k. I was doing 15% pre-tax, but I just changed to 10% pre-tax and 5% post-tax (Roth)?? Last year was the first year I maxed out my pre-tax. I recently got a promotion and get an annual bonus around Sept/Oct that contribute most of. I also have a retirement from working at Wells Fargo over 10 years ago. No idea where or how to find this or how much is in it. Questions: 1. what bills, if any, should I overpay? 2. Our jobs are stable and not at risk. Do I have too much in CDs/HYSA? 3. bonus question: Can someone explain cashing out Crypto accounts to me? When and how do I pay taxes if I were to cash that out?