For many of us, our home loan is one of our biggest financial commitments. But how well are you managing yours?

If it’s a while since you’ve paid close attention to your mortgage, now could be a good time to do a checkup.

A mortgage calculator can be a great tool to help with this process. You may find your lender offers one, or you could try out Sorted’s calculator.

Here are a few ways you can use a mortgage calculator to its full potential as part of your financial planning.

Estimate your monthly repayments

A mortgage calculator is an excellent way to work out what you might have to repay, depending on the interest rate and term you choose for your home loan.

A $500,000 loan on a 6.99% rate over 30 years, for example, would come in at just over $3,300 a month.

See what difference an extra payment will make

One of the really handy functions of a mortgage calculator is that it can show you quickly what difference changing your repayments might make to the total cost of your mortgage.

Increasing your monthly repayment by $100 might not seem like much, say, but a calculator might show you that it will reduce the total interest on that $500,000 30-year loan from more than $696,000 to just under $621,000 – saving about $70,000 in total interest costs.

Moving your repayment amount around in this way can be really inspiring. When you work out what might be achievable for you, you can talk to us as your mortgage advisers about the ways you might be able to make it happen.

Some calculators will also show you the potential impact of a one-off lump sum payment.

Compare interest rates

You might be tossing up between taking a short-term fix or a longer-term one. Sorted’s mortgage calculator will let you choose from the actual interest rates being offered by lenders at the moment, enabling you to compare what you might be paying in each of those scenarios .

Check out strategies

You can use a calculator to work out how things such as splitting a home loan into parts and fixing for different terms would look in practice.

That $500,000 loan divided into two, with $200,000 fixed for two years and $300,000 for three might cost $3225 a month in total if you were able to secure rates of 6.99% and 6.49%, respectively, for example.

Maybe you want to see what a floating revolving credit portion might do to the mix, too.

Check your borrowing power

You can often use lender’s mortgage calculators to check how much you might be able to borrow. These will generally only give a rough idea, because your individual circumstances play a big part in this equation, but it will give you an idea.

Like to talk?

A mortgage calculator is an excellent tool, but sometimes you just can’t beat advice from an expert. If you have questions about your current home loan, or any borrowing you’re thinking about doing, get in touch with us. We’d be happy to work through the scenarios with you to find you a solution that fits your needs.

Disclaimer: Please note that the content provided in this article is intended as an overview and as general information only. While care is taken to ensure accuracy and reliability, the information provided is subject to continuous change and may not reflect current developments or address your situation. Before making any decisions based on the information provided in this article, please use your discretion and seek independent guidance.