Recently, I came across a borrower who had opted for ICICI Smart Fix Home loan. Under this loan product, your loan is fixed rate for a few years (3 years in this case) and thereafter becomes a floating rate loan. Intuitively, such a loan product could be useful if you expect interest rates to go… Continue Reading
A friend had to buy a car. For the funding, he was considering 3 options. Break bank FDs and pay for the car Take a car loan Take loan against the FD He was not too keen on breaking the fixed deposit. Two reasons. Firstly, he didn’t want to break the FDs. Accumulating a corpus… Continue Reading
The Reserve Bank of India recently cut Repo rate by 0.25% from 6.25% p.a. to 6.0% p.a. You have heard that the rate cut by the Reserve Bank will lead to lower EMI. However, despite this rate cut, let’s say, your loan EMI has not gone down. What could be the reasons and what can… Continue Reading
You’re looking to buy a car using a bank loan. You already have an existing home loan with your bank that you have been aggressively prepaying over the years. Your bank app tempts you with a customized top-up loan offer with instant approval and 24-hour disbursal. Should you use it to finance your car purchase?… Continue Reading
You are taking a home loan. You are worried, who will repay the loan if you were not around? The lenders (the banks and NBFCs) are bothered about this too. And this is a genuine problem for every stakeholder. You, your family, and the lender. How will the loan be repaid if the borrower passes… Continue Reading
Home loans are long tenure loans. 15-30 years. And even a difference of a few basis points can make a huge difference to your overall nominal outgo. Assuming the interest rates stay constant, here is the difference between the cash outgo to repay a Rs 50 lacs home loan in 20 years. Interest Rate 7.50%… Continue Reading
The Reserve Bank has come out with two separate circulars in the middle of August 2023. First about levy of penal interest and the second about the reset of interest rate in retail floating rate loans. We discussed both these topics when the RBI broached these topics for the first time. Coming Soon: EMI Defaults… Continue Reading
RBI has increased repo rate from 4% p.a. to 6.5% p.a. since May 2023. If your home loan is benchmarked to RBI Repo rate, that means a hike of 2.5% in your home loan interest rate. Impact of Interest Rate Hike on Your Loan Tenure Usually, the default option in case of interest rate hike… Continue Reading