I’m sure you all know that when you take out a mortgage loan, you pay back the principal plus interest over the life of the loan, in monthly payments. But it’s important to understand that monthly payments are not simply the principal plus interest divided by the total length in months. Because the amortization schedule ensures that each monthly payment is the same amount, it may appear as though each payment is identical. However, this is not the case.
Amortization schedules determine what percentage of each monthly payment is principal and what percentage is interest. When you first get a loan, nearly the entirety of your monthly payments are used to pay off interest, with scarcely any reduction in the principal. As you pay off more of your interest over the life of the loan, a greater percentage goes towards the principal. When you sell a home that still has a mortgage, the amount of money you receive due to equity depends on how much of the principal amount is paid off. If it’s still very early in the loan’s lifetime, you haven’t paid much of the principal, so your equity will be quite low.
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