Don't be afraid of mortgage insurance, and don't pay early-withdrawal penalties and taxes just to get rid of it faster. For a well-qualified borrower with a reasonable down payment, MI is often far smaller than people assume. The exact cost depends on your credit, down payment, and program, and MI pricing changes, so get a current quote and compare that monthly cost against what the withdrawal would actually cost you in penalties and taxes. When we run those two numbers side by side, the MI is usually the cheaper path by a wide margin. One distinction matters a lot here. Borrowing against a retirement account, a loan you repay to yourself, can be a reasonable way to fund a down payment because it triggers no taxes or penalties. A straight early withdrawal, taxed and penalized, purely to eliminate MI a bit sooner is the version we'd steer you away from. On a conventional loan, MI generally drops off as you build equity, and FHA has its own removal rules, so confirm the current guidelines for your loan before you assume you're stuck with it long-term. We'll run the MI-versus-withdrawal comparison with you on the free Roadmap conversation, about 20 minutes where we run your real numbers.