Make One Extra Mortgage Payment Per Year
Many homeowners choose to make one extra payment per year to pay off their mortgage faster.
One of the easiest ways to make an extra payment each year is to pay half your mortgage payment every other week instead of paying the full amount once a month. This is known as biweekly payments.
When you make biweekly instead of monthly payments, you end up adding one extra payment each year.
However, you cant simply start making a payment every two weeks. Your loan servicer could be confused about getting irregular, partial payments. Talk to your loan servicer first to arrange this plan.
You could also simply make a 13th payment at the end of the year. But this method requires coming up with a lump sum of cash. Some homeowners like to time their extra payment with their tax return or with a yearly bonus at work.
However you arrange it, making an extra payment each year is a great way to pay off a mortgage early.
As an example, if you took out a mortgage for $200,000 on a 30year term at 4.5%, your principal and interest payment would be about $1,000 per month.
Paying one extra payment of $1,000 per year would shave 4½ years off your 30year term. That saves you over $28,500 in interest if you see the loan through to the end.
Paying down your mortgage balance quickly has other advantages, too.
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If You Dont Have An Amortization Schedule
If you donât have an amortization schedule on hand, you can still estimate how much time is left on your mortgage. Using the ârenewal or refinanceâ tab of the Ratehub.ca mortgage payment calculator, we can figure out how long is left on your mortgage. To use this method, youâll need two figures:
- The amount left to pay on your mortgage
- The interest rate youâre likely to be approved for
If youâre not sure what rate youâre likely to be approved for, the calculator will suggest some rates currently available on the market. Keep in mind that you might not be approved for rates that low.
Once youâve entered the amount and rate, pick an amortization period of up to 30 years. The âotherâ option lets you type a specific value. The calculator will then give you the monthly payment required to pay off your mortgage within that time. Next, change the amortization period until the monthly payment is close to the amount that you currently pay.
The amortization period you settle on is a good estimation of the number of years it will take to pay off your mortgage.
Calculate Your Payment And More
How much interest can be saved by increasing your mortgage payment? This mortgage payoff calculator helps you find out. Click the “View Report” button to see a complete amortization payment schedule.
Learn more about specific loan type rates| Loan Type | Purchase Rates | Refinance Rates |
|---|---|---|
| The table above links out to loan-specific content to help you learn more about rates by loan type. | ||
| 30-Year Loan |
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What Documents Can You Expect
The documents you receive may depend on your loan servicer. Heres what you can expect, which documents are essential and which ones you can make do without.
If you dont have proof within about 90 days that the certificate of satisfaction has been recorded, you may need to contact your loan servicer and speak with the lien release department.
Reduce Your Balance With A Lumpsum Payment
An alternative to recasting is to make lumpsum payments to your principal when you can.
Have you inherited money, earned large bonuses or commission checks, or sold another property? You could apply these proceeds to your mortgages principal balance and be debtfree a lot sooner.
Since VA and FHA loans cannot be recast, lumpsum payments might be the next best thing. Also, youll save yourself the bank fee for recasting.
With some mortgage servicers, you must specify when extra money is to be put toward principal. Otherwise the extra money could be split between the interest and the principal as it is divided within a regular monthly mortgage payment.
Check with your servicer if you dont know how additional payments will be applied.
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Pay Off Your Mortgage Or Grow Your Wealth: Which Is Best
The choice often comes down to whether you have retirement savings or not. The younger you are, the more you should focus on retirement savings.
Later, when compound interest has grown your wealth, you could make extra payments toward your home loan principal to build equity quickly.
If your retirement portfolio is in good shape, try to make extra mortgage payments early to reduce the principal youre paying interest on.
Other Ways To Pay Off Your Mortgage Faster
Refinancing isnt the only way to reduce the term of your mortgage. Consider the following alternatives before you decide whether refinancing is right for you:
- Make payments more often. Make biweekly instead of monthly mortgage repayments. Because there are a little over four weeks in a month, youll end up making two extra payments a year.
- Repay more when you have unexpected funds. Consider dumping your tax refunds, work bonuses or dividends from any other investments. This can also help you cut down the interest payable.
- Increase your payments when interest rates are low. If you have a variable interest rate, keep making the same monthly payments when your interest rate goes down the difference will go directly to your principal.
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Expert Tips To Pay Down Your Mortgage In 10 Years Or Less
Purchasing a home is a dream for pretty much everyone. But, taking on that massive debt can prevent you from retiring earlier, sending the kids to college, or taking that dream vacation. Like any other debt, if youre able to get rid of your mortgage as soon as possible, the better off youll be down road.
This may sound like an uphill battle that you cant win, but if you follow these 12 expert tips, you may be able to actually pay your mortgage off within a decade.
Calculating Your New Payoff Date
Using the above calculator can help you get a clear picture of how much more quickly you can pay off your loan based on how much extra you plan to pay each month. The above calculator is also useful if you are trying to figure out how much extra you would need to pay if you want to have your house paid off by a certain date to meet financial goals, such as being able to retire early.
To use the calculator, just put in the amount of the original loan, the interest rate, the length of the loan, and the monthly payment that you propose. The results will be e-mailed directly to you within moments with a plain-English analysis. If you are trying to figure out how much you need to pay to meet a pay-off goal, you will just need to keep experimenting with the monthly payment until you get the results you want.
Of course, the calculator can only give you an estimate to help guide your financial planning. You will need to talk directly with a loan counselor to understand how your payments impact your particular loan. For example, you loan may include a penalty for early re-payment. By talking to a loan counselor, you can understand all the circumstances that may affect your loan so that you can make the best decision to meet your financial goals.
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Bring Your Lunch Into Work
Sure, bringing an egg salad sandwich to work every day isnt as fun as going to a restaurant with your coworkers. But trading lunch out for eating in can make you a lean, mean, mortgage-free machine.
Suppose packing your lunch frees up $100 to use toward your mortgage every month. Based on our example above of the $220,000 loan, that $100 in lunch money will help you pay off your mortgage four years ahead of schedule and save you nearly $27,000 in interest!
Cant quite spare a whole $100 from your food budget? No worries. Even small sacrifices can go a long way to help pay off your mortgage early. Put Andrew Jackson to work for you by adding just $20 to your mortgage payment each month. Based on our example, youll pay your mortgage off a year early, saving over $6,000 in the process.
What Are My Ongoing Monthly Expenses
Paying off your mortgage is no small feat and it changes the way youll financially maintain ownership of your home. Lenders will often consolidate property taxes and homeowners insurance fees into your monthly payment through the escrow account. Once your relationship with the lender is dissolved, youll start making those payments yourself.
If your lender required homeowners insurance, youre no longer under the obligations of the loan, so you can opt out. Of course, homeowners insurance is a financial safeguard against damage to your property in case of natural disasters, accidents, robberies and more, so its a good idea to keep it. To do that, contact your insurance provider to remove your lenders payment information and set up your own auto pay.
For the lifespan of your mortgage, youve paid property taxes in monthly installments. Then, the lender pays the lump sum annually or semi-annually to relevant tax authorities.
Now, youll pay your local tax office directly. Dont be surprised if you receive a large bill in the mail. Its easy enough to estimate and save for your property tax payment.
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Increase Monthly Payments To Repay Your Loan Faster
What Happens After I Pay Off My Mortgage
After your mortgage has been paid off, it must be recorded with the county by sending whats called the Discharge of Mortgage document. Your lender is required to write up the document, but what happens next is up to local regulations.
Some states require the lender to send the document to you, while others require the lender to send it to the county. Regardless, the burden is on the lender to draw up the document, but its on you to make sure its sent to your countys Registry of Deeds.
Contact your lender to find out what your state requires for the Discharge of Mortgage and to get answers to other questions about your loan.
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Tips To Pay Off Your Mortgage Faster
- Make payments more often. Make weekly or bi-weekly payments instead of monthly payments. Because there are a little over four weeks in a month, youll end up make two extra payments a year by making bi-weekly payments.
- Choose accelerated payments. Avoid paying so much interest and pay off your mortgage faster by choosing accelerated payments. You can pay slightly more than a regular weekly or bi-weekly payment by choosing the accelerated option.
- Repay more when you have unexpected funds. Consider dumping your tax refunds, work bonuses or dividends from any other investments onto your mortgage this can also help you cut down the interest payable. But watch out for early repayment fees.
- Increase your payments when interest rates are low. If you have a variable interest rate, keep making the same monthly payments when your interest rate goes down the difference will go directly to your principal balance.
- Consider refinancing. Your mortgage rate may not be the most competitive product on the market anymore. Consider refinancing to a mortgage with a lower interest rate.
Adding Extra Each Month
Simply paying a little more towards the principal each month will allow the borrower to pay off the mortgage early. Just paying an additional $100 per month towards the principal of the mortgage reduces the number of months of the payments. A 30 year mortgage can be reduced to about 24 years this represents a savings of 6 years! There are several ways to find that extra $100 per month taking on a part time job, cutting back on eating out, giving up that extra cup of coffee each day, or perhaps some other unique plan. Consider the possibilities it may be surprising how easily this can be accomplished.
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Your Ultimate Guide To Stamp Duty In Victoria
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19 Oct 2021
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Reasons To Prioritize Investing First
Some homeowners would rather put every spare penny into an investment rather than paying down their mortgage debt. Their rationale is that the return on the invested dollar is greater than the guaranteed return youd get for paying off your mortgage.
Take for instance a homeowner with $50,000, deciding whether to invest or pay their mortgage. They could make a lump sum payment towards their current mortgage. The additional $50,000 would reduce the principal borrowed and this reduces the overall interest paid. If the mortgage was $450,000, the homeowner locked in their mortgage rate at 2.85%, and if they made no other accelerated or lump sum payments, this additional $50,000 would reduce the overall amount of interest theyd pay on their mortgage by $44,880. . This is like getting a guaranteed return of 2.8% on your invested money. Compare this to high-interest savings accounts that pay between 1.5% and 2% or GICs that pay 1.95% or 2.25%, and this return looks good.
But if youve been a disciplined saver or if you have a pension you can count on in retirement, it may be possible to take the $50,000 and invest it in riskier investments for a possible better return.
Should You Payoff Your Mortgage Early
That depends and theres no cookie-cutter answer. It comes down to whether you prioritize eliminating debt or growing your investment portfolio.
If you receive a windfall and youre tempted to pay off your mortgage, you might be better off investing the money and sticking to your normal repayment plan.
However, if you prefer the peace of mind of eliminating debt, this freedom could win over potential gains from investments.
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