With a full-time job, no debt and a big savings account, Claudia Kuekelheim could have afforded a lot more house. Instead, the German office manager and her engineer husband used their credit to get a mortgage with predictable monthly installments they could pay more quickly. “We probably could have gotten a 100 percent mortgage, but we want the house to be paid off before we retire,” said Kuekelheim, 42, who paid 24 percent up front and chose a higher interest rate because it’s fixed for 20 years. “We were worried that rates would end up being too high for us if we only fixed it for 10 years.” Germans are taking out ... (full story)