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How to Refinance a Home Loan or Investment Loan?

Learn how to refinance your home loan or investment loan with our expert tips and advice, and find out how you can save money on your mortgage repayments.

Refinancing Your Home Loan: How to Save Money and Lower Your Monthly Payments?

Refinancing a mortgage loan involves taking out a new loan to replace your current mortgage loan. The aim of refinancing is to secure a more favourable loan product that better suits your financial situation or lifestyle.

The first step in refinancing is to evaluate your current loan product and determine whether it still meets your financial needs. You should review your loan every two to three years and compare it with other available loan products on the market to see if there are better deals available. Loan features and factors to consider are the current interest rates, annual or monthly fees, loan terms, and monthly payments.

Once you have decided to refinance your loan, you will need to find a new lender and submit an application for a new loan product. During the application process, you will be required to provide the lender with financial information, such as your income, assets, and debts, to help them assess your eligibility for a new loan.

Once your application is approved, the new lender will pay off your existing loan and transfer the ownership of the property to themselves. You will then begin making repayments on the new loan, which may have different terms and conditions than your old loan.

When considering refinancing your home loan, it’s essential to remember that there are various costs associated with the process. These costs include lenders’ application fees, valuation fees, and legal fees. Moreover, government transfer and registration costs are also charged every time you refinance, and these costs get added onto your loan balance. It’s crucial to take into account these expenses before deciding to refinance. For instance, if you refinance your loan within a year, the costs of refinancing may outweigh the potential savings you could make. It’s crucial to calculate at what stage the loan break-even will start to save you money in the long run. Therefore, it’s important to carefully weigh the pros and cons and determine whether refinancing is the right financial decision for you.

9 Common Reasons to Refinance Your Home Loan

Refinancing your home loan is a common strategy that homeowners use to achieve various financial goals. Here are nine common reasons to consider refinancing your home loan:

01

Lower Interest Rates: Refinancing your home loan when interest rates are lower can result in significant savings on your monthly mortgage payments. By securing a lower interest rate, you can reduce your overall interest expenses over the life of your loan.

02

Shorten the Loan Term: Refinancing to a shorter loan term can help you pay off your mortgage faster and reduce the amount of interest you pay over the life of the loan. For example, if you currently have a 30-year mortgage, refinancing to a 15-year mortgage could save you thousands of dollars in interest. Please note, your repayments will increase so your income needs to be adequate to meet these new repayments.

03

Debt consolidation: If you have high-interest debt, such as credit card balances, car loans, personal loans, or department store lines of credit, you may be able to consolidate that debt into your home loan. This can help lower your overall interest rate across all these liabilities and simplify your finances by making just one monthly payment.

04

Switch from Variable Rate to Fixed Rate: Refinancing from an variable rate mortgage to a fixed rate mortgage can provide more stability and certainty in your monthly mortgage payments. This can be particularly beneficial if interest rates are expected to rise in the future.

05

Home renovations: Refinancing can be an option if you need funds to renovate your home. By refinancing your mortgage, you can access your home’s equity and use the funds to make upgrades, extensions or repairs.

06

Changing loan or product features: Refinancing can also be an opportunity to change the features of your home loan, such as adding an offset account or changing the repayment frequency. This can help you tailor your loan to better suit your financial needs, goals and lifestyle.

07

Remove a Co-Borrower: If you originally took out your home loan with a co-borrower, refinancing can help you remove them from the loan agreement. This can be useful if you have gone through a divorce or if your co-borrower’s financial situation has changed.

08

Accessing equity: Refinancing can also give you access to the equity in your home, which you can use for a variety of purposes such as home renovations, wedding costs, holiday, new car or further investment purposes.

09

Switch lenders for better service: If you’re not happy with your current lender or your lenders overall product suite is inadequate to meet your financial goals or lifestyle, i.e., better internet banking, better wealth creation software, better reward programs, you can refinance to a new lender who has these banking requirements to improve your overall experience as a borrower.

Refinance Home & Investment Loan with Neomoney.

The Main Reason to Refinance?

By securing a lower interest rate, you can reduce your overall interest expenses over the life of your loan.

What Are The Costs I May Incur With Refinancing?

Refinancing your home loan can involve various costs, including application fees, valuation fees, legal fees, and discharge fees. It’s important to be aware of these costs when considering refinancing, as they can impact the overall cost-effectiveness of the new loan product.

One particular cost to be wary of when considering refinancing is the potential for hidden costs associated with certain loan products. For example, some lenders offer “Low Introductory” or “Honeymoon” interest rate loans, which can appear attractive at first but may come with higher costs and switching revert rates in the long run.

Once the introductory period ends, these loans often revert to a standard variable rate product, which may be higher than a normal discount rate loan on offer. This can result in significantly higher interest costs and loan repayments over the life of the loan, offsetting any initial savings from the lower introductory rate.

In addition to the potential for higher interest rates, it’s also important to check the exit costs associated with these types of loan products. Many of these loans may come with zero entry fees to entice you into the product, but may include high discharge fees if you choose to exit the loan early. This can make it difficult or costly to refinance again in the future, or to switch to a more suitable loan product if your financial circumstances change.

Overall, it’s important to carefully consider all of the costs associated with refinancing, including both, your current lenders exit fees and new lenders upfront fees, lenders legal fees, government transfer and registration fees and ongoing interest costs. It’s also important to seek professional advice from a qualified mortgage broker or financial advisor like us at Neomoney to ensure that you are getting the best possible loan product for your individual needs and financial situation.

What Are Refinance Transfer and Registration Fees?

Refinancing your home loan involves taking out a new mortgage loan to replace your current mortgage loan. When you refinance, you will need to pay a range of government fees, including transfer and registration fees. These fees are charged by the government and are necessary to transfer the ownership of the property from the old lender to the new lender.

Transfer fees are a state government fee that is charged to transfer the title of the property from the old lender to the new lender. These fees vary between states and territories and can range from a few hundred dollars to several thousand dollars.

Registration fees are also charged by the state government and are necessary to register the new loan with the relevant government agency. The amount of registration fees varies depending on the size of the loan and can also vary between states and territories.

When refinancing, it’s important to factor in these government costs associated with a refinance, as they can add up and may outweigh the cost savings of refinancing. It’s also important to note that some lenders may offer to pay these fees as part of their refinancing package, or cash back offers, so it’s worth talking to us at Neomoney to find what offers are available from different lenders to find the best suited financial product that will assist with your refinancing.

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