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[F710]Free Mortgage Amortization Calculator

by Gerald Mason, Ger

Early in the days of the Internet, online mortgage calculators quickly became popular. What you used to have to pay for; you could now get in seconds and with many alternatives. Advanced versions today permit you to make complex comparisons of different kinds of mortgages and can even help you in decisions of when or whether to buy, sell or foreclose.

One of the bonuses is that you can often receive mortgage calculators freely on the internet.

Mortgage calculators are powerful tools because of the speed and accuracy with which they can deliver information. If you are looking to find out how much mortgage you will pay, a mortgage calculator can analyze and give you a figure within seconds.

Time is one of our most precious commodities. Mortgage calculators allow us to use time more effectively because they analyze so many variables of house buying lightning speed. If you had to spend the time sitting in a mortgage broker's office while they calculated out every alternative possible to get you the best mortgage, then you would be there at least an afternoon. And that would be for the possibilities for just one lender.

A mortgage calculator allows you to use the interest rates for any number of mortgage lenders in your area. Then it lets you input different variables such as the length of time you want to pay the mortgage. You set the information for different prices of houses, and not just one, so that you know what your best financial options are.

There are a variety of mortgage calculators. Some of them are pretty standard and just permit you to determine the monthly mortgage payment for a fixed interest mortgage or an adjustable rate mortgage. Others are even more powerful. They allow you to do a comparative analysis using the same loan calculator. By using the mortgage calculator together with a home budget calculator, you can quickly get an accurate overview of your financial situation, and whether or not now is the right time to buy a new property.

Apart from the sophisticated data that the computer is able to deal with, the best part of using a mortgage calculator is that it gives you accurate information in a format you understand. You don't have to read pages and pages of complicated financial terminology and do complex calculations to find out what you really want to know. The mortgage calculator doesn't confuse you with the marketing ploys of a lender or broker. Instead, you input simple figures and get a simple calculation - within seconds - and without leaving your home or office!

Mortgage calculators are powerful tools because they put you in control! You make that appointment with your realtor or mortgage lender confident that you know your financial status and which mortgage you need. You also have the satisfaction of knowing you've checked out all possible alternatives to find your perfect mortgage.

A good mortgage calculator is like a slide rule. If you know how to use it, you can beat a computer. Many of the mortgage calculators on the web even include ways to figure out how much you can afford. That comes in handy if you like eating.

Perhaps the most important part to getting pre-approved is to pull a "tri-merge" credit report well in advance of when you intend to buy. What does "tri-merge" mean? It is a credit report that includes data from each of the three credit repositories or bureaus (the terms are used interchangeably), Experian, Equifax, and Trans Union. Each of the three repositories will report a slightly different score based on the individual models they use to determine your score. Lenders will take the middle score as the representative score to help determine your particular creditworthiness.

There is often a big discrepancy between the three repositories. I have seen a great many times where prospects have come to me with a stellar report from one repository and when we pull the tri-merge we discover old or erroneous collections or other derogatory information reported by the other repositories that may hurt their chances of buying a home. Whether you as a consumer do it or have a lender do it for you, pulling the report early allows you to spot any errors far in advance and allow you adequate time to have them corrected. In many instances your lender can have errors corrected relatively easily using services they have paid for already. In some instances there are charges for these corrections and they may be passed on to you at the time of closing, but they usually amount to only a few dollars.

Do not close out old accounts or open new ones unless instructed to do so. Age of accounts has an impact on your scores, so that Visa card account from fifteen years ago that you never use, but for some reason is still open is having a positive effect on your scores. It is showing fifteen years worth of positive history, so closing it may have a negative impact on your overall scores. Additionally, opening new accounts have the same negative impact because you have now increased your overall debt capacity and you may change your debt-to-income ratios and therefore your ability to qualify. This rule applies even after you have been approved for a mortgage. Many people want to go out and start buying furniture or appliances for their new home after they have been approved. Do not do this. Lenders reserve the right to pull an additional credit report up to the day of closing, so any new accounts may suddenly impact your loan or worse yet mean you do not qualify, which is not something you want to find out the day of closing.

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