Shorten that $3*^!
Wouldn’t it be nice to not spend the last week of the month stressing about making your loan repayments? To have a little more money in the bank for the fun things in life (hello, weekends away). To look at the interest you pay on your loan without a good old stress-induced panic attack rearing its head?
‘How?’, you ask? Simple changes like switching to a home loan that allows for fortnightly instead of monthly repayments, for instance, could take years off your loan and save you a tonne in additional interest.
Let us explain:
Let’s say your monthly mortgage payment is $2,500. Over 12 months that’s $30,000. Now, what if you switched from monthly to fortnightly payments instead?
You would pay $1,250 over 26 fortnights or $32,500, (as opposed to $30, 000 with monthly repayments). That means paying off an extra $2,500 of your loan each year. Find a way to fork out that extra $48 a week and you could take a whole 3 years and 1 month off your mortgage. That is $30,1544 in saved interest payments.1 We rest our case.
Hint: finding a loan that includes a redraw facility will ensure you can withdraw cash from your account if you get a little too enthusiastic with those extra repayments. Smart, we know.
More savings, less dead money
Second, boost your savings and put less of your paycheck into that seemingly bottomless interest repayment chasm made up of dead money.
It doesn’t seem much, we know, but an interest rate reduction of as little as 0.5% could save you tens of thousands of dollars over the course of your loan.
‘How?’, you ask?
Let’s say you have taken out a $400,000 loan with a repayment term of 25 years and an interest rate of 4.3%. Hypothetically, you decide to switch lenders and land a reduced rate of 3.8%. This small change will save you $33,222 over the life of your loan.1 Alright, you can pick your jaw up off the ground now.
Stop donating money to your bank
Third, consolidate your debts and work towards cleaning up that (less than pristine) credit history. By reviewing your existing debts and mortgage, and combining them into a new mortgage, you can condense them into one manageable monthly repayment. Obviously, this is only a viable solution where the cost of the new loan, inclusive of fees and interest, is less than the amount you are currently paying across all of your debts. If you do fit into this category, however, it can make a world of difference. So if your credit card, car loan, personal loan and overdraft repayments are stacking up, it’s certainly worth talking to a Loan Market broker to see if debt consolidation could make your life easier.
So if you’re one of the 75% of Australians who haven’t refinanced their mortgage, it’s time. Get a professional on your side and let someone who understands the system help you get your finances in check, at least until the stress migraines cool down.