What is loan amortisation?

Understand how loan amortisation works, how it affects your home loan repayments, and how you can use it to pay off your loan faster and save more.

Loan amortisation is the process of repaying a loan through regular payments over a set period of time. Each payment includes both the principal amount borrowed and the interest charges. In the beginning, the interest portion is higher, and as the loan matures, the proportion of the principal in each payment increases, which reduces the balance of the loan until it’s paid off completely.

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How does the ability to redraw decrease from loan amortisation?

When you make extra repayments on an amortised loan, you reduce the principal balance faster than originally scheduled. This can reduce the amount of interest paid over the life of the loan because interest is calculated on the outstanding balance.

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If your loan has a redraw facility, any extra repayments you make above the required minimum repayments may be available to withdraw later, subject to your lender's rules. This redraw amount is typically linked to your additional repayments rather than the difference between the original loan amount and the current loan balance.

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If you redraw some or all of those extra funds, your loan balance increases again, meaning more interest may be charged over time than if the extra repayments had remained in the loan.

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