Online, handheld, or software-based mortgage calculators can enable you to easily determine how much your monthly payments will be, along with the total cost of a mortgage. Here are some tips on how to use and find mortgage calculators…

When entering the “mortgage amount”, this should be the purchase price with the down payment subtracted from it, unless it separately asks for the down payment. Some mortgage calculators have a feature which tells the user how much the mortgage will cost during its entire term. If the calculator you use lacks this feature, you can determine the entire cost by first multiplying the monthly payment by twelve, then multiplying it by the number of years until the mortgage will be paid off. Keep in mind that this does not include closing costs, unless it specifically requests their amount. An online or software-based calculator might ask for a PMI percentage or amount; this refers to “Private Mortgage Insurance.” Just enter zero if it doesn’t apply to you.

Handheld calculators vary from one model to the next in how they work, but these generally have a set of buttons to press when entering each factor involved in taking out a loan (interest, amount, term, etc). Various abbreviations may be marked on the button used when specifying the amount of money being loaned; common examples include “L/A” (loan amount) and “PV” (the principal’s value). Some of the more expensive units have buttons like “ARM” (adjustable rate), “Dn Pmt” (down payment), “Int-Only Pmt” (interest only payments), or “P-A-P” (for pick-a-payment style mortgages).

There are a wide variety of mortgage calculators available, each with different pros and cons. Bankrate.com offers a free online calculator with fields for information on early payments you plan to make, while mortgagecalculator.org has property tax and PMI fields, along with providing three different graphs. Bloomberg.com’s calculator gives results without leaving the page it is on, and shows the total interest cost, total payments, and monthly payment. For greater portability and convenience, handheld calculators to use for this purpose can be purchased from various retailers (including Radio Shack and eBay). A number of shareware and freeware software mortgage calculators are available for  download from various web sites; these allow such calculations to be performed without being connected to the internet.

Keeping in mind the above-mentioned tips on how to use and obtain mortgage calculators should help you more effectively use them to calculate the costs of different mortgages.