Unless you receive a windfall, you'll likely need to use a combination of the strategies above to pay off a 30-year mortgage in 10 years. For instance, you could refinance to lower your interest rate, select a shorter loan term and make additional principal payments each month.
Refinance into a shorter term
When you refinance your home, you can pay off your home faster by replacing your 30-year mortgage with one that's a shorter term. With a mortgage refinance, you can shorten your loan term by selecting a 20, 15, or even a 10-year loan.
The most common amount of time, or “mortgage term,” is 30 years in the U.S., but some mortgage terms can be as short as 10 years. Most people with a 30-year mortgage won't keep the original loan for 30 years.
Options to pay off your mortgage faster include:
Bi-weekly payments instead of monthly payments. Making one additional monthly payment each year. Refinance with a shorter-term mortgage.
Even one or two extra mortgage payments a year can help you make a much larger dent in your mortgage debt. This not only means you'll get rid of your mortgage faster; it also means you'll get rid of your mortgage more cheaply. A shorter loan = fewer payments = fewer interest fees.
Making extra payments of $500/month could save you $60,798 in interest over the life of the loan.
The additional amount will reduce the principal on your mortgage, as well as the total amount of interest you will pay, and the number of payments.
Making additional principal payments reduces the amount of money you'll pay interest on – before it can accrue. This can knock years off your mortgage term and save you thousands of dollars.
So if you're 10 years into a 30-year mortgage term, you could potentially refinance to a 10-year term and shave off 10 years. On the flip side, you could go for another 30-year term to lower your monthly payments.
Usually the maximum age at the end of the mortgage term should be 70 or your retirement age – whichever is sooner. If you'll be older than this, we'll still consider your application but you'll need to provide us with proof that you'll be able to repay your mortgage when it extends into your retirement.
There's no need to pay off your mortgage by a certain age, although one common rule of thumb says you should pay off your mortgage before you retire. The idea is that getting rid of one of your biggest monthly expenses means you need less income to cover your living expenses.
You might want to pay off your mortgage early if …
You want to save on interest payments: Depending on a home loan's size, interest rate, and term, the interest can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars over the long haul. Paying off your mortgage early frees up that future money for other uses.
Before paying off a loan ahead of schedule, it's important to read the fine print. Based on the terms of your loan, you could be subject to a prepayment penalty for paying off your mortgage early. Typically, loans older than three years are not subject to this type of penalty.
The 10/15 rule
If you can manage to pay 10% of your mortgage payment every week (in addition to your usual monthly payment) and apply it to the principal of your loan, you can pay off your 30-year mortgage in just 15 years.
If you pay $200 extra a month towards principal, you can cut your loan term by more than 8 years and reduce the interest paid by more than $44,000.
the extra $500 goes towards the principle only and the loan. Gets paid down much faster, your saving a lot of money over the years in interest. Talk to your lender and he will tell u how much you will save and how much faster the loan will be paid off. It is a good thing to do if you can.
This amortization schedule shows that paying an additional $300 each month will shorten the life of the mortgage from 30 years to about 21 years and 10 months (262 months vs. 360). It will also reduce the total amount of interest paid over the life of the mortgage by $209,948.
When you make an additional payment, you have the option to apply it toward your loan's principal. This will gradually chip away at your loan balance and could ultimately reduce the amount of interest you pay over time. As your loan balance decreases, the amount of interest added to each payment also drops.
If your lender allows biweekly payments and applies the extra payments directly to your principal, you can simply send half your mortgage payment every two weeks.
With $2,000 per month to spend on your mortgage payment, you are likely to qualify for a home with a purchase price between $250,000 to $300,000, said Matt Ward, a real estate agent in Nashville. Ward also points out that other financial factors will impact your home purchase budget.
Making an extra payment on your mortgage can help you pay off your mortgage early. It also helps reduce the principal balance quicker which means there is less principal to gain interest. In the long run, your extra payments could help you save money as well as reducing the length of your loan term.
This is equivalent to 12 slightly-higher monthly payments of $1,252.85 — but this small difference is enough to pay off your full debt in just 22 years and cost you only $129,712.85 in interest. In other words: two extra mortgage payments per year will save you eight years and $56,798.72 in interest.