How Much Would Refinancing Your Home Loan Save? Run Your Own Numbers (2026 Calculator)

How Much Would Refinancing Your Home Loan Save? Run Your Own Numbers (2026 Calculator)

Every borrower has a vague feeling their rate could be better. Vague feelings do not refinance loans; numbers do. So here are yours: the calculator below takes your balance, your current rate, a comparison rate and your remaining term, and shows the monthly difference plus the cumulative savings over one, ten, twenty and thirty years. It runs in your browser and stores nothing. The timing writes itself: with the RBA meeting on 11 August and markets expecting a hold after the soft June-quarter inflation print, lenders are competing for refinancers rather than waiting for the cash rate to hand them growth, and the gap between back-book and new-customer pricing, the loyalty gap, is the widest lever most households own. Run the numbers, then let a former banker check whether the market actually beats your rate, free. Census night is a national prompt to look at the number: our piece on the mortgage question the census asks explains why Tuesday is the moment.

The refinance savings calculator

Use the rate from your statement, not your memory of it; the two disagree more often than people expect. Be realistic on the comparison rate, and if part of your loan is fixed, break costs change the arithmetic, which is exactly the kind of thing a review nets off before you decide. Investment loans carry their own pricing tiers and the same calculator logic applies.

How to read your result honestly

Two disciplines keep the number real. First, same term against same term: a refinance that quietly stretches your remaining 22 years back to 30 will show a seductive monthly saving while costing you more interest overall, which is why this calculator refuses to play that trick. If cash-flow relief via a longer term is genuinely what you need, it is a legitimate choice made with open eyes, not a default accepted unread. Second, net off the costs: discharge and application fees, government charges, and break costs on fixed portions all come off the savings, and cashback offers go into the same arithmetic. On a fixed loan, price the break cost before trusting the savings number; it is the one switching cost that can move the whole answer. If year one of savings covers the switching costs, the remaining years are pure margin; our plain-English refinancing guide walks the full mechanics, and the self-audit helps you scope your position first.

The other way to spend the same saving

Here is the fork most borrowers never get shown. Take the monthly saving as relief, and your budget breathes. Or refinance and keep paying exactly what you pay now, and the entire saving attacks your principal each month: on the same $600,000 example this article’s calculator uses, that choice pays the loan off years early and avoids six figures of interest, with no change to your monthly life. We built a dedicated years-off calculator for that version, and the honest answer for many households is a split: hold some, pocket some. Whichever you choose, make sure the features you keep are working; our offset check calculator exists because, as ASIC just showed, they sometimes are not.

From number to settlement

The calculator tells you what a rate gap would be worth. What it cannot tell you is whether that gap exists for you, and that is measurement, not guesswork: your loan, your property, your income shape, against the live pricing of 40+ lenders. That comparison is the free part of what we do, it involves no credit enquiry until you decide to lodge, and it ends in one of two honest places: a switch worth making, handled end to end including the repricing conversation with your current lender if that is the better path, or confirmation your loan is sharp, which is worth having before a fixed term rolls over or the next rate cycle turns. If the number is good but you are not sure the moment is, our guide to when to refinance your home loan covers the timing triggers. Business owners: the commercial version of this calculator runs the same arithmetic for facilities.

Frequently asked questions

How much can I save by refinancing my home loan?

It depends entirely on your balance, remaining term and the gap between your rate and what the market writes for your situation, which is why generic promises are meaningless. The calculator on this page turns your actual numbers into a monthly figure and cumulative savings over 1, 10, 20 and 30 years; as an illustration, half a per cent on a $600,000 loan over 30 years is roughly $195 a month.

Is the saving shown by the calculator guaranteed?

No. It is an estimate from figures you enter, on a principal and interest basis, holding your term constant and excluding fees, charges and break costs, and the comparison rate is yours rather than an offer. Treat it as the reason to get a real comparison, not as a quote; the review confirms what lenders actually write for your loan.

Does refinancing restart my 30-year loan?

Only if you let it. You can refinance to a term matching your remaining years, which keeps the comparison honest and is how this calculator models it, or deliberately choose a longer term for cash-flow relief, accepting more total interest. The trap is doing the second accidentally, which is common because lower repayments look like savings on paper.

Do I lose money to fees when I refinance?

There are usually costs: discharge fees from your old lender, government registration charges, sometimes application or valuation fees, and break costs if part of your loan is fixed. Cashback offers can offset them. The clean test is whether your first year or two of rate savings covers the lot; a review nets this off precisely before anything is lodged.

Will getting a refinance quote hurt my credit score?

A comparison does not: reviewing your loan against the market involves no credit enquiry and nothing on your file. An enquiry only occurs if you proceed to an actual application with a lender. Running this calculator and having a review conversation are both consequence-free ways to find out where you stand.

Should I refinance before or after the RBA’s August meeting?

The loyalty gap this calculator measures exists independently of any single meeting, and expectations have already flipped once this fortnight, so waiting for certainty is mostly waiting. Markets currently expect a hold, an environment in which lenders compete hardest for refinancers. Positioning before a decision beats reacting after one; this is general information, not advice on timing.

Is it worth refinancing for a small rate difference?

Run it rather than guess: even a quarter of a per cent on a large balance over a long term can outweigh switching costs, while the same gap on a small balance with high exit fees may not. The 1-year row in the calculator against your total switching costs is the honest first test, and the review does the exact version.

Sources

Related guides

Important information