How to avoid Prepayment Penalty on Installment Loans: Quick Guide from BridgePayday
The use of unexpected cash windfalls to pay down debt is a frequently touted tidbit of financial wisdom. But what if paying down your debts is accompanied with a prepayment penalty?
Choosing a personal loan or mortgage with no prepayment penalties is, of course, the easiest approach to avoid prepayment fees. However, if you have a prepayment penalty on your loan, all is not lost. There are a few options for avoiding prepayment penalties on loans.
What is a Prepayment Penalty, and how does it work?
A prepayment penalty is a fee charged by a lender if you pay off your loan before the term expires. It might be aggravating to be charged by a lender for paying off a loan early because it’s natural to believe that a lender would prefer to be paid as soon as possible.
A lender, in theory, would prefer to be paid fast. But it’s not that straightforward in reality. Lenders generate the majority of their money from interest, so if you pay off your loan early, the lender may lose out on the interest payments they expected. A lender might recuperate their financial loss by charging a prepayment penalty if you pay off your loan early.
The prepayment charge may be calculated based on the loan’s principal or the amount of interest remaining when you pay off the loan. The penalty could alternatively be a set amount specified in the loan contract.
Is it possible to pay off a loan sooner than expected?
Consider a $5,000 personal loan you took out three years ago. Even if you’ve been making payments for three years, the loan is still two years away from being paid off. You’ve lately been given a big quantity of money and want to use it to pay off your personal debt as quickly as possible.
Is it possible to repay a personal loan early without incurring penalties? It is subject to the lender’s discretion. BridgePayda offers installment loans with no prepayment penalties. Mortgage prepayment penalties are more common than personal loan prepayment penalties.
What Are the Differences Between Prepayment Penalties?
Because personal loan terms vary, the best way to figure out how much a prepayment penalty will cost is to read the terms of the loan before accepting it. Lenders are required to inform you of the amount of the prepayment penalty before you take out the loan.
Personal loans have a prepayment penalty if you pay them off early
The loan duration is five years if you take out a $6,000 personal loan to renovate your guest room into a pet portrait studio and agree to pay your lender $125 per month for five years. Even if your loan term stipulates that you must repay it within five years, some lenders insist that you repay it within the same time frame.
The lender profits from your loan’s monthly interest, but loses money if you pay it off early. Prepayment penalties are used by the lender to make up for the money they lose when you pay off your loan early.
How Are Prepayment Penalties Calculated?
The cost of a prepayment penalty varies significantly depending on the loan amount and how your lender calculates the penalty. BridgePayday utilizes a variety of strategies to determine how much of a prepayment penalty to apply.
If your loan has a prepayment penalty, knowing the exact amount might help you evaluate if paying the penalty is worth it when weighed against the benefits of paying off your loan early. According to Usman Konst, an expert financial analyst of BridgePayday explains that the cost of a prepayment penalty can be estimated in three ways:
- The interest rate. If you have an interest-based prepayment penalty on your loan, the cost is computed based on the amount of interest you would have paid over the loan’s whole term. If you have a $6,000 loan with a five-year term and want to pay off the remaining debt in four years, the lender may charge you a penalty of 12 months’ interest, as in the preceding case.
- The remainder of the proportion. The penalty cost is calculated by certain lenders as a percentage of the remaining loan balance. This is a common technique of calculating a mortgage prepayment penalty cost. Let’s imagine you spent $500,000 for a house and have already paid off half of your mortgage, but you want to pay off the remaining debt in one lump sum before the loan’s term ends. Your lender may levy a penalty equivalent to a percentage of the remaining $250,000 in this case.
- You only have to pay once. Some lenders only charge a set fee as a prepayment penalty. This implies that no matter how early you pay off your loan, the amount you’ll have to pay will always be the prepayment penalty specified in your loan agreement.
How to Avoid a Prepayment Penalty
It may appear that avoiding prepayment penalties is an exercise in futility, yet it is doable. Taking out a loan or mortgage with no prepayment penalties is the quickest approach to avoid them. If that isn’t possible, you might have other options.
Talk to your lender if you already have a personal loan with a prepayment penalty and wish to pay it off early. You may be given the option of paying off your loan sooner rather than later to avoid the penalty. Alternatively, you may discover that, even if you pay off the loan early and suffer a penalty, the penalty is less than the interest you would have paid throughout the loan’s remaining period.
You can also check your loan origination documents to see if a partial payback is permitted without penalty. If it does, you may be able to prepay a portion of your loan each year, allowing you to pay off your debt faster and avoid paying a penalty fee.
Some mortgages, for example, allow you to pay up to 25% of the purchase price once a year without incurring a penalty. This implies that, while you may not be able to pay off your entire mortgage, you can make annual payments of up to 25% of the purchase price without incurring a penalty.
Some lenders change the conditions of their prepayment penalties over the course of your loan. This implies that as you approach closer to the conclusion of your original loan term, your prepayment penalty fees may be reduced or eliminated entirely. If that’s the case, it could be a good idea to wait a year or two until the prepayment penalties are reduced or eliminated.