whats a good rule of thumb for mortgage refi?

You could always make additional monthly payments towards principal to knock down the life of the mortgage.

Tell people all the time, look into the 20 yr fixed rate instead of 15. It's not as bad of a jump and the rates are great.

the rule I 1% down. if you going to refinance your going to need to safe at least 1% on the rate to make it worth doing. Also the more you owe the better the savings but that goes without saying. The 20yr rate is around 3.375% today and the 30yr rate is 3.625% ...I swear if one person starts bragging about there home rate from 3 years ago I am going to track you down and baseball bat your knees!

I refi'd with quicken last year and told them I wanted a no-cost refi with lender paid PMI, since I'd only be in the home for a few more years.

I ended up with a higher rate than if I had paid closing costs and normal PMI, but I still lowered my interest rate overall, and transitioned to a 15 yr mortgage.

My payment went up 400 dollars but I knocked 11 years off of my mortgage and I'm putting the old PMI money into more equity instead.


Quicken was very easy to work with and it helps that they offer just about every type of combination of services to get you where you need.

Did your fees add to your principal?

I made sure mine would not

All of my fees were paid with points