Australia Extra Repayments & Redraw Calculator

It depends on your balance, rate, term, and how much extra you repay — but even modest, regular extra repayments can save a significant amount in interest and years off your loan. For example, on a $500,000 loan at 6% over 30 years, an extra $300 a month can cut total interest meaningfully and pay the loan off several years earlier. Enter your own numbers into the calculator above for an exact figure.

Yes — fixed-rate home loans in Australia commonly cap penalty-free extra repayments at a set dollar amount per year, often around $10,000 across major lenders. Exceeding this cap on a fixed loan can trigger a break cost. Variable-rate home loans typically have no such cap and allow unlimited extra repayments, often alongside a linked redraw or 100% offset facility. The calculator above flags it clearly if your planned extra repayments would exceed a fixed-rate cap.

A redraw facility lets you access extra repayments you've already made directly on the loan itself — the money reduces your loan balance (and the interest charged) exactly like this calculator models, and you can withdraw it again later, sometimes subject to fees or minimum-withdrawal limits. An offset account, by contrast, is a completely separate transaction account whose balance offsets the loan interest calculation without ever having been paid onto the loan — more flexible, and generally more accessible, but the effect on interest saved is very similar. See our Offset Account Calculator to compare.

Both reduce your balance and future interest, and an earlier repayment (of either kind) saves slightly more interest than the same amount paid later, since it stops accruing interest sooner. Regular monthly extra repayments are easier to build into a budget and compound their benefit steadily over the loan; a one-off lump sum (for example from a bonus or tax return) delivers an immediate one-time reduction. Combining both approaches maximises the interest saved for a given total amount repaid.

This depends on your lender — most Australian home loans keep your contractual monthly repayment the same and simply pay the loan off earlier (which is what this calculator assumes), though some lenders let you choose to instead reduce your monthly repayment while keeping the original term. Check with your lender which option applies to your specific loan.

Fixed rates give you repayment certainty — your rate (and repayment) won't change even if variable rates rise during the fixed period — which some borrowers value more than unlimited extra repayment flexibility, especially if they don't expect to have significant extra funds to repay during the fixed term. Many lenders also offer a "split loan" structure, part-fixed and part-variable, letting you get repayment certainty on part of the loan while retaining unlimited extra-repayment flexibility on the rest.