Multiple time-stepping (MTS) algorithms allow to efficiently integrate large systems of ordinary differential equations, where a few stiff terms restrict the timestep of an otherwise non-stiff system. In this work, we discuss a flexible class of MTS techniques, based on multistep methods. Our approach contains several popular methods as special cases and it allows for the easy construction of novel and efficient higher-order MTS schemes. In addition, we demonstrate how to adapt the stability contour of the non-stiff time-integration to the physical system at hand. This allows significantly larger timesteps when compared to previously known multistep MTS approaches. As an example, we derive novel predictor–corrector (PCMTS) schemes specifically optimized for the time-integration of damped wave equations on locally refined meshes. In a set of numerical experiments, we demonstrate the performance of our scheme on discontinuous Galerkin time-domain (DGTD) simulations of Maxwell's equations.