Paying an extra $500 a month on your 30-year mortgage significantly shortens your loan term and saves you tens, even hundreds, of thousands in interest by attacking the principal faster, potentially shaving years or even a decade off your payments and freeing up cash flow sooner, though the exact savings depend on your loan amount and interest rate.
Making extra payments of $500/month could save you $60,798 in interest over the life of the loan. You could own your house 13 years sooner than under your current payment.
Pay extra toward your mortgage principal each month: After you've made your regularly scheduled mortgage payment, any extra cash goes directly toward paying down your mortgage principal. If you make an extra payment of $700 a month, you'll pay off your mortgage in about 15 years and save about $128,000 in interest.
No matter how much extra you pay each month, that amount can help shorten the life of your loan. Even making one extra mortgage payment each year on a 30-year mortgage could shorten the life of your loan by four to five years.
Making extra payments on the principal balance of your mortgage will help you pay off your mortgage debt faster and save thousands of dollars in interest.
5 savvy ways you could pay off your mortgage sooner
What is the 3-7-3 Rule? Within 3 business days of your completed loan application, your lender must provide initial disclosures. This includes the Loan Estimate (LE), which outlines your estimated loan terms, interest rate, closing costs, and monthly payment breakdown.
Make one extra mortgage payment each year
Making an extra mortgage payment each year could reduce the term of your loan significantly. The most budget-friendly way to do this is to pay 1/12 extra each month.
When you prepay, you are lowering the interest you owe, which could alter your taxes. Another downfall is if you decide to move. You would have paid extra money without getting the rewards of living mortgage-free.
What is the 2% rule for mortgage payoff? It's commonly believed that borrowers should strive to reduce their interest rate by 2%.
Switching to biweekly payments is one of the easiest and most effective ways to pay off your home loan faster. When you pay half your mortgage payment every two weeks results in 26 half-payments, which equals 13 full payments each year instead of 12.
Biweekly payments accelerate your mortgage payoff by paying 1/2 of your normal monthly payment every two weeks. By the end of each year, you will have paid the equivalent of 13 monthly payments instead of 12. This simple technique can shave years off your mortgage and save you thousands of dollars in interest.
But with nearly two-thirds of retirement-age Americans having paid off their mortgages, it means that the average age they have gotten rid of that debt is likely in their early 60s. Stats from 538.com, for example, suggest the age is around 63.
How to Pay Off a 30-Year Mortgage Faster
By making extra payments, you decrease the principal amount, which means the interest percentage is charged based on a smaller principal. You may also finish paying off your loan sooner – each month you don't need to make a payment is an interest charge you don't have to pay.
Mortgage points, also known as discount points, are a form of prepaid interest. You can choose to pay a percentage of the interest up front to lower your interest rate and monthly payment. A mortgage point is equal to 1 percent of your total loan amount. For example, on a $100,000 loan, one point would be $1,000.
“Paying off your mortgage early seems impossible but it is completely doable and people do it all the time, but how can you do it and why would you want to put in the extra effort? Paying off your mortgage early will rev up your wealth building.”
By doing this, you can potentially shave several years off your loan term and save thousands of dollars in interest, since you can allocate your extra payments entirely to the principal, rather than the interest-laden monthly payments you're making normally. Essentially, a 30-year mortgage could become a 25-year one!
Disadvantages of paying off your mortgage early
Pay Off Your Mortgage in 10 Years – Here's How!
Not Putting Extra Payments Toward the Loan Principal
Otherwise, you may not see much progress in your early mortgage payoff efforts because your extra payments will be absorbed by interest.
If you pay $100 extra each month towards principal, you can cut your loan term by more than 4.5 years and reduce the interest paid by more than $26,500. 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.
For years, Dave Ramsey has pushed a hardline stance when it comes to mortgages: buy with cash if you can, but if you need a loan, never take one longer than 15 years. It's an appealing idea. Pay off your house fast.
To afford a $400,000 home, assuming a 20% down payment and a 6.5% interest rate on a 30-year mortgage, you would need a gross monthly income of about $7,786.55. This assumes you have $1,000 in monthly debt.
Making extra principal payments is the primary way to pay off a 30-year mortgage early and reduce the total interest paid. Switching to biweekly payments results in making one additional payment per year, which can reduce your mortgage term by a few years.