Loan Calculator
Since you may have happened upon this loan calculator to calculate a monthly payment, I'll cut to the chase. You'll only need to enter three numbers, and you can leave the other dozen or so options untouched.
Here's all you need to do.
- Click clear and enter values for:
- Loan Amount
- Number of Payments
- Annual Interest Rate
- Leave Loan Payment Amount set to 0.
- Click either "Calc" or "Payment Schedule."
There you have it. Now you have what you need.
This calculator though offers users so much more. Spend a few minutes with it, and you'll see. More below
Info...
VERY IMPORTANT - You must enter a 0 if you want a value calculated. Some users have been frustrated by this. They want to know why the calculator does not just recalculate a payment if they have changed the loan amount, interest rate or term.
This is because we want the calculator to be able to create an amortization schedule using whatever parameters you want to use. This behavior is a feature! After all, there is no such thing as a "correct" loan payment. The payment amount is correct as long as both the lender and debtor agree to it!
ABOUT DATES - This calculator now allows irregular length first periods. That is, the calculator calculates the exact amount of interest due even when the initial period is shorter or longer than the other scheduled periods. This will result in payment amounts as well as interest charges that do not match other calculators. If you want to match other calculators then set the "Loan Date" and "1st Payment Date" so that the time between them equals one full period as set in "Payment Frequency". Example: If the "Loan Date" is May 15th and the "Payment Frequency" is "Monthly," then the "1st Payment Date" should be set to June 15th, that is IF you want a conventional interest calculation. See amortization with dates — first period interest & year-end totals for details about the long and short period interest options.
Of course, you can always leave the dates set as they are when the calculator loads.
Much More Than a Payment Calculator
Since the calculator will solve for multiple unknowns, it can easily be used to answer the following questions:
- How much can I borrow?
- What would my payment be?
- What is the lending rate?
- How long will it take to pay off my loan?
- What date is my loan paid off?
- NEW - what is the impact of extra payments?
See the payment schedule for total interest saved.
On a more general note, we have been discussing details about loans, some structured with unusual features, over several decades. At this point, we believe our software calculators can create a schedule for any structured settlement loan that exists. If you have a loan with special requirements, please ask.
Hopefully, you'll find this loan calculator as well as all the financial calculators on this site to be useful tools. Why not take another sip of your favorite beverage and explore for a few minutes? Start by checking out The Reading Room. Here you'll find a half dozen articles, written by professionals, about money.
Loan Calculator Help...
This calculator will solve for any one of four possible unknowns: "Amount of Loan", "Total Scheduled Periods" (term), "Annual Interest Rate" or the "Periodic Payment".
Enter a '0' (zero) for one unknown value.
The term (duration) of the loan is a function of the "Total Scheduled Periods" and the "Payment Frequency". If the loan is calling for monthly payments and the term is four years, then enter 48 for the "Total Scheduled Periods". If the payments are made quarterly and the term is ten years, then enter 40 for the "Total Scheduled Periods".
The "Amortization Method" should be set to "Normal" (level payments) unless you have a specific reason to set it to another method. &Fixed Principal" causes the amount allocated to principal to be the same each period which result in decreasing payments.
If the terms of the loan call for a 0% interest rate, then the "Amortization Method" must be set to "No Interest," otherwise entering a zero for "Annual Interest Rate?" will cause the calculator to calculate an interest rate. Selecting "No Interest," also lets the user set the payment amount to "0" to tell the calculator to calculate it.
When the first period, the period of time between the "loan date" and the "first payment date" is longer than one full period, there will be interest due for the "extra days". This is known as "odd day interest." Example: if the "loan date" is March 24 and the "first payment date" is May 1, then there are 8 odd days of interest - March 24th to April 1st. How the odd day interest is calculated and collected is controlled with the "Long Period Options." By default, the odd days interest is shown being paid on the loan date.
Conversely, if the time between the "loan date" and "first payment date" is less than the payment period set, then the first period is said to be a "short initial period" and the first payment will be reduced due to less interest being owed. How the payment amount and interest is calculated for a short period is determined by the "Short Period Options."
Join the conversation. Tell me what you think.
Sharon S says:
Karl, you are a genius! I should have read through the comments before sending my initial comment. I found your Ultimate Financial Calculator and it fit my needs perfectly. Thank you for sharing your expert tools. By the way, these are so intuitive to use even for a “non” numbers person like me!
Thank you and best wishes to you.
Karl says:
Wow, thanks! Yup, UFC is the right calculator to use for your needs. Glad you found it, and found it useful.
Hans says:
For a traditional loan and flexi loan, I am going to assume the calculations are the same if you’re not going to dump any money in the principal? I mean the method of calculating how much goes to principal and how much goes to interest is the same regardless of the loan type?
Karl says:
By "flexi loan", are you referring to the payment amount changing?
If so, then yes, but I will add one condition to your statement "the method of calculating how much goes to principal and how much goes to interest is the same regardless of the loan type and when the amortization method is set to Normal"
Hans says:
Ah, got it! Thanks, Karl!
Karl says:
You’re welcome.
betty says:
Hi. I am owner financing a mobile home….The occupants want to pay it off about 1/2 way into the loan term. This is good news.
The only things I don’t know how to calculate are:
The cost of plywood for a floor repair that I paid for them the first month – need to add that to the loan balance (or take it off of the original down payment).
Also 6 months ago, I had to have the property inspected due to an insurance company complaint following the company’s drive by.
I hired an inspector, met with the tenants, had a contractor ready to do work when purchasers emailed that they would do all repairs. So there were those expenses also.
How to best get reimbursed…calculate. I can also ask for those funds to be paid at closing, but they are kind of the type that think everything should be done in their favor and i am certain that they do not want to reimburse me…oh my!
They also owe taxes and insurance for the last year.
what to do if the title company drew up a closing statement that the tenants told them was accurate…NOT!
What calculator would help me with CRAZY!
Have a good and fun day!
Karl says:
For tracking a loan payment by payment and/or for a loan with what we call multiple borrows (loan amount increases) you can use this loan payoff calculator.
Once on that page, scroll down and look at the tutorials. You should look at #1 to get started and then #25 deals with your needs. Also the tutorial about construction loans #11, should be useful for you as well.
Fred Flieler says:
Great calculator, easy to use and very comprehensive.
Can you set this up to show a 20 year amortization with a 5 year balloon?
Karl says:
Thank you.
Yes, you can create a balloon schedule with it. It is not required that there be an unknown. What you can do is enter the terms of the loan, loan amount, rate etc and set the payment amount. For the number of payments enter the payment number when the balloon will be due. Click on the "Payment Schedule" button rather than "Calc" for a schedule showing the balloon amount paid.
If this does not meet your needs tell me where it falls short. There are other calculators on this site that will also create a schedule with a balloon. Perhaps one of those will be better suited.
Bruce says:
I used your loan calculator with 0 interest and printed the schedule. After about 2 years the payment was increased. I entered the additional information in the options section, but I could not bring up the new schedule. The table chart came up but not the schedule. What have I done wrong?
Karl says:
You are correct.
However, the problem should be fixed now. I say "should" because it takes a while for code changes to propagate across the network. Depending on where you are located, you may not see the fix yet.
Thank you for letting me know. I really appreciate it.
Daniel says:
Hello,
I am unable to see the payment schedule when I set an overpayment in the options. I also set the start date to be in the past if that makes a difference.
Charts seem to work, but I wanted to see the schedule as that is more useful than a burndown chart.
Thanks for your hard work
Karl says:
That had been a problem until it was fixed late last week.
You may need to get the new code with the fix to down loaded to your browser. You can do this by forcing a hard refresh. If you are running either Chrome or Internet Explorer on Windows, you can do it by pressing "Ctrl-F5". Other browsers may require a differnt technique for a hard refresh.
Please try this an let me know how it works for you.
If it happens not to work (possible I guess, but unlikely) then please give me your inputs show that I can test and fix. Or I can suggest other calculators as well that handle extra payments.
Peter says:
Karl, thank you for the great work on this debt calculator. It is extremely user friendly. Quick question? I did not see in the menu any way to save the results of a query? Is the only way to save the results is via exporting to an Excel spreadsheet? Thank you.
Karl says:
You’re welecome.
Are you looking to save the inputs so you can reload them and rerun the schedule? (The calculator won’t do that at this time — perhaps someday.)
Or do you want to have a way of saving the schedule so you can view it later? If so, you can select all from print preivew mode and copy/paste it to Excel. (You may have to do a paste special in Excel if Excel crashes. There’s a lot written about this on the internet.)
But I think a better way is to print the schedule to a PDF file.
Chrome supports this directly.
If your browser does not support printing to a PDF, then you can install a PDF printer driver. I’ve used PrimoPDF in the past. It’s free. There are many to pick from however.
Peter says:
Karl, thank you for the very prompt and complete reply. I will do the PDF routine since that is most efficient and one I am most comfortable with. But I will also try the Excel export you suggest. I have a number of loans to family members (lucky folks) and your schedule is most helpful in keeping them on schedule and providing annual interest amounts for their records. Again, keep up the good work. I find this application one of the best on the web. Regards.
Karl says:
And I want to thank you for the opportunity to give you my sales pitch. 🙂
There’s another calculator on this site that is more appropriate for your use. The Ultimate Financial Calculator would allow you to track individual payments on a loan as they are made. This may be handy if the payment date varies and/or the payment amount changes.
If you try the calculator, scroll down the page and check out the tutorials. Everyone should read #1 to get started. Then tutorial #25 specifically deals with tracking loan payments.
The above calculator is free.
Now this where the sales pitch come in.
If the above better meets your needs, and you want to save the payments, then consider purchasing the C-Value! program. It works like the free calculator above, but it lets you save your results so you can reload them. This way you can add future payments to the ones already paid. C-Value! is downloadable software and it runs on Windows (only).
David says:
This is a very extensive tool and lots of features. Unfortunately, I am still getting the same bug that was reported over a week ago. Whenever I enter a value into the extra payment field it will no longer generate the payment schedule. It will generate a chart under this scenario.
Karl says:
I’m sorry that this problem still exists for you. Can you try it again? I redeployed the fixed code.
If you happen to have an interest in website technology, this is what’s happening. I fixed the bug on Jan.20th. This site uses a content delivery network (CDN). A CDN simply provides multiple (100’s) of servers around the globe that hosts copies of a website’s code. This allows websites to load faster since users are physically closer to the CDN’s servers than they are to a single server hosting the site.
When I deploy an update, if something goes wrong, and the code is deployed to all servers, then not all users will see the update or fix.
Hopefully this time, all servers have been updated.
Please let me know if it now works for you. Thanks.
David says:
This has been fixed, thanks Karl. I actually moved on to your Ultimate Financial Calculator last night which is really impressive and meets my needs even better than this one does.
Karl says:
Thanks for letting me know.
And happy to hear you found the UFC. That’s definitely the flagship calculator for this site.
Barbara Kostyk says:
I used this calculator for a loan in December, and it gave me the entire loan payment schedule.
I made an extra payment and now it won’t bring up a payment scedule.
Karl says:
There had been a bug prior to about Jan. 20th, but it has been fixed. The problem now is that your browser probably still has stored a copy of the code before it was fixed. You can force your browser to go to the server and get the latest fix by doing a "hard refresh."
If you are running on Windows, most browsers use the "Ctrl-F5" key combination to force the refresh. Please try this.
Anna M Sontag says:
I have a ten year note to me, and the maker is paying a little more than the amount in the note, rounding it. There may be times he pays more, or less, so I want a calculator that responds to differences in payments.
The payments have been coming later and later, and I do want to keep track of payment dates and extra fees from my bank if they occur. Is your Ultimate Financial Calculator what is best for this, or actually the C-Value? But I have a Mac ~
Suggestion?
Karl says:
Yes, the Ultimate Financial Calculator will track the payments as they come in. You can use the calculator to confirm a balance as of any date. The one thing it cannot do is save your entries, so you’ll have to reenter the payments anytime you want to check the balance.
C-Value! works like the UFC, but the user can save their entries and come back later and add or change payments. However, it only runs on Windows.
However, there is a 3rd party program for the Mac, called Parallels, that you can install on your Mac that will let you run Windows programs. This might be useful if you also have other Windows programs that you would like to run. You only need one copy to run multiple Windows apps.
Anna M Sontag says:
Thank you very much Carl. It occurs to me that I can use the regular app and just transfer the balance to a spreadsheet.
Very helpful and much appreciated!
Anna
Karl says:
If you want to use a spreadsheet, then what you can do is use the previously recommended calculator and enter the loan details and all the payments made to date to get the "current balance."
View the schedule in "Print Preview." From print preview, you can select the entire schedule and then copy/paste to your spreadsheet and save. (To paste, you may have to use the "Paste Special" feature.)
This will give you, of course, all the payments and balance that you can save. Then the next time when you use the calculator, start the calculation by enter the prior loan balance as the new loan amount and enter any additional payments. Preview and copy/paste the new payments back to the spreadsheet.
This way of course you’ll be able to change interest rates as you need and the calculator will do the interest and balance calculations for you. At the same time, you’ll only ever have to enter the payment one time. Let the spreadsheet store the payment record from inception of the loan.
If this isn’t clear, just ask.
Jean says:
Will either of the calculators make adjustments for changes in interest rates over the course of paying loan off as well as additional payments? Loaned money to our son on our preferred interest rate but it is a variable rate. Haven’t seen anything anywhere yet that allows that wrinkle.
Also what is ‘Canadian’ refer to in the Amortization method? If my bank is in Canada should I choose that instead of Normal?
Karl says:
Hi Jean. This loan payoff calculator is designed specifically for tracking individual loan payments as they are made. The user can record a payment on any date. The user can also change interest rates as often as necessary and also on any date.
If you try the calculator, please scroll down the page to the tutorials. Tutorial #25 deals with your needs. Also, take a look at #1 to get started.
When a user selects the "Canadian Method", all that is doing is telling the calculator to use monthly payments with semi-annual compounding. This results in slightly less interest being owed for any given interest rate when compared with monthly compounding.
Jean says:
Great! Thanks Karl. This is going to be perfect – and easy – for me!!
Nate says:
Hi,
Thanks for the great tool. I am encountering a bug when I specify the loan date to Feb 1 2014 and set the first payment date to March 31 2018. I am using 8 quarterly payments.
The payment schedule is showing a payment value on the original loan date.
Thanks.
Karl says:
Thank you. Glad you like it.
And that’s not a bug. What you are seeing is the accrued interest for the long initial period i.e. from Feb. 1, 2014 to Dec. 31, 2017.
How this accrued interest is accounted for is entirely under user control. If you want to see it with the first payment, the go to the options tab and under "Long Period Options?" select "With First." There are other options available as well.
Hope this helps.
nathan says:
Oh, thanks for clarifying that. I’m not well versed on this subject. I tried again and found exactly what I was looking for- amortized long period interest.
I really appreciate what you’ve provided here. A a very useful and powerful tool, completely free of charge. Thanks again.
Karl says:
You’re welcome. Happy that it helped.
David VanHatten says:
Wow, this was very helpful…once I figured ou how to set the dates as needed. I just needed the numbers. Thank you so much.
I have a small token of appreciation for you. Reply to my email.
Paul Philippi says:
Is there an amortization program which I can down load to my computer rather than having to go online? Several years ago, I purchased one from Pine Grove for around $15 if I remember correctly, but have just changed computers and it seems to have been lost in the change over. I’d like one in which extra and/or missed payments are able to be calculated. Also would be nice if I could change currency symbols etc. thanks for reply.
Karl says:
This is Pine Grove Software LLC, just the domain and website have changed.
Two downloadable programs are currently available for Windows computers. Both create amortization scheduled. C-Value! @$49.95 and SolveIT! @ $69.95.
C-Value! is a single calculator and it should meet your needs because it allows for both random and regular extra payments.
On the other hand, SolveIT! includes C-Value! plus 40 more calculators.
Nathan Parke says:
I don’t recall your website acknowledging my 1st submission of suggestions. This 2nd submission is more complete and better-edited.
————————————————————————————
Suggestions…
#1 Option to store the Payment Schedule as a file, preferably as an an Excel file, but at least as a file type that can be easily copied into an Excel sheet.
#2 Option to also store the Calc results as described in #1 above.
#3 Option to display Payment Schedule as annual totals only, in addition to the default display the that provides both monthly totals and annual totals.
——————————————————————————————————————
Calculator use… I use a fixed rate loan calculator for loans to my children. I provide Excel Sheets that document them. When the Fed changes rates, I terminate existing loans, copy their Excel sheets to new sheets to serve as templates, recalculate the loans, and copy calculator results into the new sheets..
Reasons for needing your calculator… I adopted your calculator when cBanque removed the English version of their calculator. Your calculator provides most of cBanque’s flexibility — term can effectively be stated as a number of months; start date can be earlier than the current date; a loan fiscal year can end on any month. The only flexibility missing is the option to display Scheduled Payments totals for years only vs. both years and months.
Missing flexibility for all calculators… The option to to store calculator results as files, as well as print them.
Please consider my suggestions for additional flexibility and the reasons for them.
Thank you,
Nat Parke
Karl says:
Thanks for the input Nathan.
Thank you for the other insights.