Today I saw a news story that left me speechless. A guy in Zhejiang has a mortgage of 2.08 million yuan, and for nine years, he has been paying 9,100 yuan every month without fail. Nearly a million in hard cash has been poured in, but the principal has hardly moved. During these nine years, he has lived like a ascetic, avoiding socializing and consumption, and the bank calls him a "high-quality customer."

But no one told him that in the first ten years of equal principal and interest payments, most of the payments go toward interest. He's just working for the bank.
Ordinary people don't understand financial rules, yet they have to spend half of their most valuable time paying the price. Remember this: choice is far more important than blind effort.