The Truth About Raising Kids While Paying Off a Home

Imagine waking up in your 30s with zero mortgage payments.

No monthly mortgage hanging over your head. No bank hovering over you. Just the freedom of knowing that the home you live in is completely yours.

That is what we achieved when we paid off our modest townhouse in just seven years.

At the time, my husband was making about $50,000 a year, we had two young children, and we were living primarily on one income. It wasn't because we received an inheritance or had some huge financial breakthrough.

We simply made a radical decision to live slower and smaller.

Looking back, there are things we would do exactly the same way, and there are also some things we would change. But paying off our mortgage quickly changed much more than our bank account. It changed the way our entire family lived.

We Started Small

We got married young and bought our first home with the little money we had.

It was a small condo, around 1,000 square feet. At the time, we saw it as an investment. We thought we could eventually use the money we made from it to help us buy a bigger home.

My husband had just graduated from university and started a modest-paying job. I was working part time, and eventually we had our first child.

When our son was about six months old, we moved into the townhouse we still live in today. It was around 2,000 square feet, and the money from our first condo helped us put money toward the townhouse.

That first small home was an important step for us. We didn't start with the house we ultimately wanted. We started with what we could afford.

We Chose to Live on One Income

When we had our first child, we decided that I would stay home with the kids.

I was an actress at the time, and acting can be a difficult way to make a consistent income. You can go to countless auditions before getting one paying job, and auditions themselves can cost money. There were classes, transportation and other expenses.

We could have tried to increase our household income, but instead we looked at staying home with the kids as an investment in our family.

We didn't want to build a lifestyle that required us to constantly earn more money.

Instead, we decided to live slower and smaller.

That decision was incredibly valuable to us.

We Lived Below Our Means

When we were young, we could have spent more money on vacations, restaurants, clothes and things we wanted.

But we kept thinking about the bigger picture.

What was the point of spending money on a vacation if we were going to come home and feel stressed about our finances?

We wanted to pay off the mortgage quickly so that eventually we could have complete freedom with our money.

So we paid our required expenses, put money toward the mortgage and lived on what was left.

It wasn't always glamorous, but it worked.

We Learned to Cook Almost Everything at Home

One of the biggest things that helped us save money was learning to cook.

Growing up, I didn't really learn how to cook. Once I got married, I started watching YouTube and the Food Network constantly. I found it inspiring, and eventually cooking became something I genuinely enjoyed.

Instead of going to coffee shops, restaurants or convenience stores for food, we made things at home.

We baked muffins. We made snacks. We dried fruit. We cooked meals from scratch.

And we did it together as a family.

If we wanted to go to a restaurant, we would sometimes find a recipe online and recreate it at home. It became our little frugal date.

It wasn't about never enjoying food. It was about finding a different way to enjoy it.

Even small daily expenses can add up. If you spend around $27.40 a day, that works out to roughly $10,000 a year.

That is money that could instead stay in your pocket, go toward debt or be invested for the future.

Our Kids Didn't Have an Expensive Childhood

Our children didn't grow up with an expensive childhood, and I'm actually happy about that.

We didn't feel like we needed to constantly buy things to keep them entertained.

We went to the park.

We made crafts at home using old cereal boxes, cardboard and egg cartons.

We went to the library.

We went to free local concerts.

We used secondhand toys and hand-me-downs.

My mom had kept many of my childhood toys, so some of the toys my children played with were literally mine when I was young.

A neighbour who ran a daycare also gave us some of the toys she no longer needed. I would keep them in the basement and bring them out for Christmas or birthdays.

To my kids, they were simply new toys.

They didn't care that they were secondhand.

They were happy.

We Didn't Schedule Every Minute of Their Childhood

This is probably one of the more controversial parts of our parenting philosophy.

We didn't put our kids into endless extracurricular activities.

They didn't have every weekend filled with soccer, hockey and organized activities.

We wanted slow weekends.

We wanted time together.

We wanted them to have the opportunity to be bored.

Being bored gave them the freedom to play together, explore their interests and discover things on their own.

The library offered free activities from time to time, such as LEGO building, robotics and cooking. Their school also offered inexpensive lunchtime activities.

They still had opportunities to learn and participate, but we didn't feel the need to fill every available hour.

Now that they're older, they have their own passions and interests. They're also very close to each other.

I grew up with a much more packed schedule myself. I spent many hours swimming and skating, and although I loved skating, I remember how stressful that schedule could be.

Looking back, I would have loved the opportunity to try more things at my own pace.

That is one thing I'm grateful I was able to give my children.

We Didn't Take Expensive Vacations

We didn't travel by plane when our kids were little.

Flights for a family of four can be incredibly expensive, especially when you're travelling internationally.

Instead, we took smaller vacations. We went to cottages with their grandparents and brought our own food.

The kids got to spend time with family and enjoy a change of scenery without us spending a fortune.

And something interesting happened.

When I recently asked my kids if they remembered certain toys they had received, they often couldn't remember.

But they remembered going to parks.

They remembered spending time with family.

They remembered going to the local beach.

The memories that stayed with them weren't necessarily the things we bought.

They were the experiences.

We eventually took them on a plane for the first time when they were older, and they really appreciated it.

It was also much easier to travel with older children.

We Learned That Kids Don't Need Everything They Ask For

We didn't give our kids everything they wanted.

If we went into a store and they wanted a particular toy or car, sometimes the answer was simply no.

And that was okay.

They learned that you can't have everything you want.

That lesson has stayed with them.

Now that they're teenagers and young adults, they have more financial responsibility.

They help around the house. They clean their own bathroom and help with cooking. We don't pay them for regular household chores because we see those things as part of being a member of the family.

We buy birthday and Christmas gifts, but if they want something beyond that, they generally use their own money.

My older son has been earning money since he was 13 through content creation. When he wanted a new computer setup, he bought it himself.

He also pays for things like his schooling, bus pass and other purchases that are important to him.

I think there's something powerful about buying something with your own money.

You tend to take better care of it.

When we give children responsibility with money at a young age, we're also helping them learn how to manage it when they're older.

We Don't Keep Up With the Joneses

One of the biggest advantages of living frugally is that you eventually stop caring about what everyone else is doing.

Our car is 16 years old.

We've had it since our second child was born, and because we take care of it, it still looks relatively new.

We don't replace things just because they're no longer trendy.

The same goes for our home.

Our decorating style is pretty timeless and neutral. We don't redecorate for every holiday or chase every new home trend.

When our kids were little, if we wanted decorations, they could make them.

We'd put their homemade decorations in the windows and enjoy them.

We didn't need to go to the dollar store every few months to buy more seasonal decorations that would eventually end up in storage or the garbage.

For me, less stuff means less money spent, less storage and less mental clutter.

I Don't Really Care About Fashion Anymore

I've become much less interested in fashion trends over the years.

I'll wear hand-me-downs.

In fact, the shirt I'm wearing in the video belonged to my mom. Because she's taller than me, it fits me more like a dress.

And I actually like it more because it has a story.

I'm not interested in buying clothes every week or even every month.

This year, I bought one piece of clothing that I really needed: a pair of running shoes that were on sale.

For me, clothing is primarily functional.

I still wear skinny jeans even though they aren't considered the trendiest thing anymore.

But I'm comfortable in them, and that matters more to me.

The Frugal Mistake We Made

We did make mistakes.

One of our biggest mistakes was buying things simply because they were cheap.

When we didn't have much money, inexpensive items were tempting. But sometimes we would have to replace those things a few years later.

This was particularly painful with big purchases like refrigerators, stoves and other appliances.

Eventually, we learned an important lesson:

Sometimes the cheaper option isn't actually cheaper.

Today, we're willing to spend more on something that we know we'll use every day, provided we believe it will last.

That includes things like appliances and even my camera.

I've had my camera for around five years and use it constantly for my work. I'd rather invest in something good than continually replace cheaper equipment.

Frugality isn't about buying the cheapest thing.

It's about getting the most value from the money you spend.

One Thing We Should Have Spent More Money On

There is one thing I wish we had prioritized more when we were aggressively paying off our mortgage.

Our relationship.

Our children were very young, and we were stressed and exhausted new parents.

We didn't always make enough time to simply be a couple.

When the kids were a little older and could spend time with their grandparents, we started going on dates.

Those dates were important.

I actually think spending money occasionally on a restaurant for two people can be a very worthwhile expense if it gives you the opportunity to reconnect with your partner.

After all, maintaining a healthy relationship is worth investing in.

We Avoided Lifestyle Inflation

Another thing we got right was avoiding lifestyle inflation.

As my husband's salary increased and I eventually returned to work and made some money from acting, we didn't dramatically increase our spending.

We kept living relatively frugally.

The difference between what we earned and what we spent could go toward savings and investments.

Eventually, the goal became bigger than simply paying off the mortgage.

We wanted financial freedom.

We wanted the option of early retirement.

We still spend around $500 a month on food for our family of four, which is something I'm particularly proud of because cooking at home has become such a normal part of our lives.

What We Do With Our Money Now

Paying off the mortgage gave us something incredibly valuable: options.

Eight years after paying off our mortgage, we finally started renovating our home.

We've renovated two bathrooms, the lobby and now we're renovating the entire basement.

We also eventually started travelling with our kids.

Because we had spent so many years living below our means, we could enjoy these things without the same financial stress.

That's the part of frugal living that I think sometimes gets misunderstood.

The goal isn't to never spend money.

The goal is to spend money intentionally.

We spent less in our younger years so that we could have more freedom later.

And now we can enjoy our money.

What Paying Off Our Mortgage Really Gave Us

Paying off our mortgage didn't just change our bank account.

It changed our family dynamic.

We had more freedom.

We had less financial pressure.

We had more flexibility.

And we gave ourselves what feels like a significant head start toward retirement.

Most importantly, we learned that happiness doesn't necessarily come from having more.

Our children didn't need the latest toys.

We didn't need the newest car.

We didn't need a perfectly decorated home for every holiday.

We didn't need to travel internationally every year.

We didn't need to fill every weekend with activities.

We needed time.

Time together.

Time to cook.

Time to play.

Time to be bored.

Time to enjoy the people around us.

If you're feeling pressure to buy more, do more or enroll your children in every possible activity, maybe it's worth asking yourself whether your family actually needs more or whether you simply need to slow down.

Because life can be surprisingly enjoyable when you're living for your family instead of living for your bank account.