1. Have a larger down payment: The larger your down payment, obviously the less you have to repay in a loan. 2. Get a shorter-term loan: you can have a biweekly mortgage that pays off a loan in 30 years, 45 years, or even 70 years in some cases, but generally a biweekly mortgage is designed to get you out of debt mortgage quickly, and one of the best ways to manage that is to set up for a shorter-term mortgage with your lender right from the beginning. 3. Budget and pay a little extra: It may not seem like much if you sent in an extra $10 per month, but $120 per year over just a 15 year loan is $1,800 less than you would otherwise have had to pay interest on - that could be the equivalent of 3-4 monthly payments. 4. Pay cash for closing: A common mistake many first-time homeowners make is jumping on the option to save their cash by rolling their closing costs for the sale of the home into the loan and thinking they got away with something when their mortgage payment goes up only a few of dollars per month as a result. When you are considering a home, having cash for the down payment is very important, but not at the expense of having no money to handle your closing costs up front.