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    This works in Bay Area because housing is so overpriced. Not in places where it's priced reasonably and mortgage interest is like 30-70% of the standard deduction. Commented Dec 4, 2019 at 14:07
  • According to a mortgage calculator that uses 3.92% interest rate, the mortgage deduction could tip past the single-filer standard deduction at about $216000 property cost. Of course early year's mortgage payments are mostly interest. But property taxes are also deductible up to a limit. Now the mortgaged property is an inflation hedge since it locks-in much of the housing cost. Commented Dec 4, 2019 at 18:18
  • 15 or 30 year? How much down payment? My 30-70% estimate off the top of my head was for joint filers so I could see it being plausible to tip past for single filers, although conversely single filers would probably save a lot more money by having a more suitably sized home for a single person... Commented Dec 4, 2019 at 19:24
  • Thanks to the Tax "Cuts" and Jobs Act of 2017, the mortgage interest is now capped for 750K of mortgage, and SALT (including property tax) is now capped at 10K. In places like California with high mortgages or places like Texas with no income tax (hence SALT is all we've got), one or the other of these can bite you easily. It only takes around $410K of real estate in TX to hit a $10K property tax. Commented Dec 4, 2019 at 20:47