What if I told you that you could pay your mortgage down faster without changing your monthly payment amount?
It’s no secret that everything is more expensive today than it was a year ago. It is becoming progressively harder for many people to stay on top of their monthly obligations. Across the country, people are desperate for quality budgeting solutions to help protect their households from inflation.
While we all hope to have a little extra money at the end of the month, the reality is that the ability to throw some extra funds toward a car loan or a mortgage is rare, and can feel unobtainable.
So How Do You Pay More Toward Your Mortgage Without Increasing Your Monthly Payment Amount?
The answer is very easy…you ready?
Split your payment into bi-weekly (every other week) payments!
Let’s break this down so I can explain how this method works:
• For sake of easy numbers, let’s say that your monthly house payment is $1000/mo. In one year, you will have paid $12,000 towards the home ($1,000 x 12 months)
• There are 52 weeks in a year, so making the payment bi-weekly ends up creating 26 payment opportunities (52/2)
• Assuming you split the housing payment in half ($1,000/2), you are left with $500 to be applied every two weeks
• $500 for each of those 26 payment opportunities will end up applying $13,000 towards the home in a year, that is an entire extra mortgage payment applied each year!
Now I know what you’re thinking… “Is $1,000 extra per year toward my Mortgage really that significant?”
Let’s dive into how far that extra $1,000/year actually ends up going! (HINT: it’s way farther than you think)
Assuming we have a $200,000 mortgage at 5% interest, that $1,000 extra breaks down to $83 extra each month ($1,000/12). Since anything additional is going to be applied directly to the principal, the total interest savings by making that one extra payment a year ends up being just over $30,000 in saved interest (over the life of the loan). In addition, your 30-year mortgage would now be a 26-year mortgage.
Paying your Mortgage biweekly saved you four years of mortgage payments and $30,000 in interest savings!
For more explanation about the details of this article, or any general mortgage questions you might have, please don’t hesitate to reach out! I’m a Licensed Mortgage Loan Originator and I would love to discuss your unique situation and questions.
Author:
An Equal Housing Lender