“We’re done,” Nat said, “We officially owe zero dollars to zero people!”

April 2018

The bank teller blinked at us, a confused look on her face.

“Ma’am… you’re here to what?” she asked me, her voice wavering with disbelief.

“We’re here to pay off our mortgage,” I said, a wide grin on my face. “Is a check all right?”

“We were going to do it online,” Nat added, “but we thought this was a cause for celebration, so we came in person.”

We’d been working through the Baby Steps, putting away 15 percent of our income toward retirement (Baby Step 4), saving each month for fertility treatments (our version of Baby Step 5), and directing the rest of our money toward our mortgage payments (Baby Step 6). And we saw clear help from Above; Nat got a new job in February that came with a pay increase. We kept our spending low in order to reach our goals, and finally, here we were.

In a matter of minutes, our final mortgage payment was processed, and we were handed a folder of documents stating that we had paid off the loan. We walked into the spring air with tears in our eyes.

“We’re done,” Nat said, “We officially owe zero dollars to zero people!”

“Baruch Hashem. It should stay that way.”