Ways to pay off your mortgage faster

When you get a mortgage, you’re likely dreaming about the day you’ll be mortgage-free. Mortgage agreements contain a timeline called an amortization period, which is the time it takes to fully pay off your mortgage. Generally, a shorter amortization period makes your mortgage payments larger and you will pay off your mortgage faster. A longer amortization period makes your mortgage payments smaller, but it'll take longer to pay off your mortgage.

Depending on the details of your mortgage, its amortization period is either chosen by you or established when you apply—but, regardless of its amortization, if you’re a homeowner who’s eager to pay off your mortgage faster, here are some ways you can make that happen.

Increase your payments

The most straightforward way to pay off your mortgage faster is by either increasing:

1. The number of payments you make
2. The amount of your payments
3. The amount and number of your payments at the same time

These extra and/or larger payments can cut years off of your mortgage and save you money on interest. It’s common for there to be guidelines on how much homeowners can increase their payments annually. Your mortgage agreement should outline the specifics on this. For example, QuestMortgage allows you to increase your mortgage payments at any time (up to 100% of the original monthly payment), so you can pay off your mortgage sooner.

It’s important to know the limits of increasing your mortgage payments because exceeding them can result in penalties. So, if you’re interested in making changes to your mortgage payments, review your mortgage and reach out to your lender to get started.

Make additional lump-sum payments

In addition to your regular payments, contributing extra money towards your mortgage (called a prepayment) can help you pay it off quicker. Common sources of extra cash that homeowners use to make pre-payments include tax refunds and annual bonuses.

Your mortgage documents should mention if it allows you to put additional money towards your balance and it’s common for there to be limits on how much additional money you can contribute. Also, it will show the applicable penalties if you go over the limit. So, it’s important to read your mortgage agreement and understand the details before adding lump-sum payments.

With QuestMortgage, you can get the Best prepayment privileges, including the option of making additional lump-sum payments up to 20% of the original balance at the start of the term, per anniversary year.

Our prepayment calculator can also help you estimate how much of a prepayment penalty you would face depending on your mortgage and desired prepayment.

“Best prepayment privileges" refers to the amount you can prepay on your original mortgage as compared to the Big Five chartered banks in Canada as advertised on their respective websites, when available and applicable.