The contents of this disc are Public Domain and may be freely distributed as long as no money is charged for it apart from a reasonable amount for copying and the cost of the media.
This program has been tested on an A600 HD, A1200 HD and an A 500 HD.
The accuracy has been checked with other commercial software and on as many existing mortgages as I could find.
Installing On A Hard Drive
To install Mortgage Calculator onto your hard drive simply create a new drawer on the partition where you wish to install Mortgage Calc. Call this drawer Mortgage. Next drag the main program called Mortgage along with the two files called Mortgage.PIC1 and MortgageWalla into the drawer called Mortgage you have just created.
Finally add the following line to your User Start-up or Start-up Sequence:
e.g. Assign Mortgage: "DH0:Mortgage"
Remember to add your own path in place of "DH0.
Using On Floppies
As well as the above files Mortgage Calc needs to have access to the following directories: L, Libs, Devs and C.
About Mortgage Calculator
Mortgage Calculator allows you to work out the cost of your mortgage, be it a repayment or an endowment mortgage. It will also take into account the current rate of tax relief and the current tax relief ceiling. Tax relief now seems to be a major target for Budget cuts (you may have recently received a letter from your bank/building society informing you of your mortgage increase due to the mortgage tax relief being reduced from 25% to 20%). Using Mortgage Calculator you could have predicted how much extra a month you have to pay when it was announced in the budget.
Mortgage Calculator is also useful when you want to move house. Can you really afford to keep up those repayments on that £120,000 mortgage your bank manager says he can arrange for you? Or is it worth changing to an endowment mortgage from a repayment mortgage? What about when you decide to get married and you have a joint mortgage with double tax relief, how much extra will it cost when your tax relief halves.
Use this program and you will be able to compare changes of any kind quickly and accurately.
Using Mortgage Calculator
To start Mortgage Calculator just double click on the mortgage icon in the normal way.Once Mortgage Calculator has loaded you will be presented with the opening screen. You can now select one of the three buttons by clicking on them with the mouse.
REPAYMENT Surprisingly this button allows you to calculate a repayment mortgage.
ENDOWMENT As above but endowment.
EXIT This button exits mortgage calc and returns you from whence you came.
note; at any time you can exit mortgage calc by pressing CTRL & C together.
Repayment Calculator
After selecting Repayment you will go to a new screen where you will be prompted for the following:
1/ The current rate of tax relief.
Just enter the rate as a whole number e.g. enter 20 not 20% or .20
2/ The current interest rate.
Again just enter 7 not 7% etc.
3/ The amount of outstanding mortgage.
Enter the amount currently out standing without the pound sign e.g. 45000 not £45000.
4/ The current tax relief ceiling.
Again just enter the amount without the pound sign e.g. 30000 not £30000.
5/ How many years are left to run on the Mortgage.
Enter the number of years left to run.
6/ Is this a Bank or Building Society Mortgage.
Click on the appropriate answer.
The monthly repayment will then be output to the screen.
7/ Finally you are given a choice of calculating some more by entering Y or returning to the opening screen by entering N.
Endowment Calculator
After selecting Endowment you will go to a new screen where you will be prompted for the following:
1/ The current rate of tax relief.
Just enter the rate as a whole number e.g. enter 20 not 20% or .20
2/ The current interest rate.
Again just enter 7 not 7% etc.
3/ The amount of outstanding mortgage.
Enter the amount currently out standing without the pound sign e.g. 45000 not £45000.
4/ The current tax relief ceiling.
Again just enter the amount without the pound sign e.g. 30000 not £30000.
The monthly repayment will then be output to the screen.
5/ Finally you are given a choice of calculating some more by entering Y or returning to the opening screen by entering N.
Definitions
Repayment Mortgage
Your monthly payments are split into two parts, the first being interest on the amount still
owing and the second part repays part of the loan
Mortgage calculator gives you the total of these two parts.
Some lenders include a mortgage protection policy premium and or a buildings insurence premium on top of your monthly payment. Remember to take this into account when calculating your mortgage.
Endowment Mortgage
Your monthly payments only pay the interest on the mortgage , a seperate investment and life insurence policy is taken out which will mature when the mortgage ends and hopefully pay off the mortgage.
The mortgage payments go to your bank or building society and the seperate insurence payments go to the insurence company who also provide you with life insurence should you die before the policy matures.
Mortgage Calculator gives you your monthly interest payments only as the amount you pay for the insurence part will vary depending on the insurence company and the type of policy taken out.
As with the repayment mortgage your buildings insurence premiums may be included in your monthy payments to your bank/building society.
Tax Relief
Everyone is entitled to tax relief on their interest payments at the rate set in the budget. This currently stands at 20% as of April 1994. This tax relief is available only on the first £30,000 of the mortgage (some people who took out mortgages a few years back are allowed joint tax relief).
e.g.
Tax relief on a new mortgage of £50,000 at an interest rate of 8% means that the first £30,000 is charged at an interest rate of 6.4% (8%-20% tax relief) and the last £20,000 is charged at the full rate of 8%.
Mortgage Calculator of cause will take this all into account all you do is enter the full interest rate.
Tax Releif Ceiling
At the moment the tax releif ceiling is set at £30,000, this of course can be changed in the budget just enter the current ceiling when prompted.
Outstanding Mortgage
To get the most accurate calculation of monthly payment the amount of mortgage currently outstanding must be known.
On an endowment mortgage this is quite easy as the outstanding mortgage should not change unless of course you are paying more or less than the correct monthly payment.
On a repayment mortgage the amount outstanding is constantly changing (hopefully getting less) as you make repayments so it is best to check you mortgage statement or with your bank/building society.
Years Remaining
This only applies to repayment mortgages as the less years you have to pay the more your mortgage will be. Mortgage Calculator takes this into account when working out a repayment mortgage.
Type of Lender
Again repayment mortgages only. Banks and Building societies use different ways of calculating interest payments (it makes very little difference to the final payment) just click on the relevent lender to take this into account.
