Biweekly Mortgage Calculator

Created by Oghenekaro Elem

Reviewed by Hanna Pamuła, PhD and Steven Wooding

Last updated: Jun 02, 2023

Table of contents:

Biweekly mortgage calculator is a tool that helps you calculate your mortgage payments on a biweekly basis. That means every two weeks. The calculator is a simple version of our mortgage calculator, which deals with all the questions arising when you are about to buy a house with a mortgage loan.

This article provides all the information you need to know about how to calculate biweekly mortgage payments and the compounding frequency involved. Perhaps you are wondering:

How does making biweekly mortgage payments work?
Is it worth paying mortgage biweekly?

You will find answers to these questions after reading this article.

If you are interested in comparing different repayment scenarios, you can use the mortgage amortization calculator which focuses on the amortization schedule of your mortgage.

What is a biweekly mortgage?

When you collect a mortgage loan, your mortgage provider provides the mortgage interest rate and mortgage term or amortization period. You can choose to pay off the loan using different payment frequencies options. The payment frequency determines the number of payments you make per year to pay off the loan at the end of the mortgage term. However, the more frequent you pay, the less interest will accrue, and you can save money on the payments.

Generally, you make mortgage payments on a monthly basis. It means that you make a single payment by each month's due date, resulting in $12$ payments per year.

A semi-monthly payment frequency would allow you to make $24$ payments per year.

But the biweekly payment frequency lets you make a payment every two weeks. Since there are $52$ weeks in the year, your total number of payments when paying bi-weekly is $26$ payments per year. That way, you can make more payments than a monthly schedule and pay off your mortgage loan faster with a full extra contribution to your mortgage repayment each year, equivalent to $13$ monthly payments. This additional monthly payment is what makes having a biweekly mortgage worthwhile.

Compounding frequency impact on biweekly mortgage payments

Different countries use different compounding frequency or compound period for mortgage interest. In a mortgage loan, the compounding frequency is the number of times that unpaid mortgage interest is added to the principal amount of the loan. Compounding frequency can be monthly, quarterly, semi-annually or annually.

The compounding frequency determines the interest rate per payment. For instance, interest is compounded semi-annually in Canada but compounded monthly in the US and UK. Our mortgage payoff calculator can quickly compare different compounding frequencies.

How to calculate biweekly mortgage payments

For example; To calculate the biweekly mortgage payment of a $\text{\textdollar}150,000$ mortgage loan with an interest rate of $6\%$ for $30$ years.

1. Determine the number of payments.

The number of payments expected, $n$ , is:

\footnotesize \begin{split} n& = \mathrm{mortgage\ term}\times\frac{n_{\mathrm{weeks}}}{2}\\ &= \mathrm{mortgage\ term}\times\frac{52}{2}\\ &=30\times26\\ &=780 \end{split}

where:

$n_\mathrm{weeks}$ — The number of weeks in a year.

2. Calculate the mortgage interest rate per payment.

Here, the compounding frequency dictates the interest rate per payment ( $\mathrm{IRPP}$ :

\scriptsize\mathrm{IRPP}\! =\! \left(1\!+\!\frac{\mathrm{ir}_{\mathrm{annual}}}{f_{\mathrm{compounding}}}\right)^{\frac{f_{\mathrm{compounding}}}{26}}-1

where:

$\mathrm{ir}_{\mathrm{annual}}$ — The annual interest rate; and
$f_{\mathrm{compounding}}$ — The compounding frequency.

Semi-annually, e.g., as used in Canada:

\qquad \quad \scriptsize \begin{split} \mathrm{IRPP} &= \left(1+\frac{6}{2}\right)^{\frac{2}{26}}-1\\[1em] &=0.2276=0.002276 \end{split}

Monthly, e.g., as used in US and UK:

\qquad \quad \scriptsize \begin{split} \mathrm{IRPP} &= \left(1+\frac{6}{12}\right)^{\frac{2}{26}}-1\\[1em] &=0.2305=0.002305 \end{split}

3. Calculate the biweekly mortgage payment using the interest rate per payment.

The biweekly mortgage payment $\mathrm{bw}$ can be calculated using the formula:

\scriptsize \mathrm{bw} = \mathrm{loan}\times\frac{\mathrm{IRPP}\times(1+\mathrm{IRPP})^{n}}{(1+\mathrm{IRPP})^{n}-1},

where:

$\mathrm{loan}$ — The mortgage loan; and
$n$ — The number of payments.

For the semi-annually compounding frequency:

\scriptsize \begin{split} &=\!150,\!000\times\frac{0.002276\times(1+0.002276)^{780}}{(1+0.002276)^{780}-1}\\ &=\text{\textdollar}411.25 \end{split}

For the monthly compounding frequency:

\scriptsize \begin{split} &=\!150,\!000\times\frac{0.002305\times(1+0.002305)^{780}}{(1+0.002305)^{780}-1}\\ &=\text{\textdollar}414.52 \end{split}

In conclusion, the biweekly payment for a mortgage of $150,000 is $411.25 for a semi-annual compounding frequency; and $414.52 for a monthly compounding frequency.

	Payment	Total payment	Total interest
Monthly	$\text{\textdollar}899.33$	$\text{\textdollar}323,\!757.28$	$\text{\textdollar}137,\!757.28$
Biweekly	$\text{\textdollar}414.52$	$\text{\textdollar}323,\!322.57$	$\text{\textdollar}173,\!322.57$
Savings			$\text{\textbf \textdollar}\bold{434.71}$

Whether your jurisdiction uses a semi-annual compounding frequency or a monthly compounding frequency, you save more using a biweekly payment schedule than paying monthly, as seen in the comparison table.

You can use our well-equipped mortgage calculator (linked above) to calculate your mortgage payments on a monthly, biweekly, or weekly schedule. It also allows you to calculate the mortgage acceleration of your payments.

Oghenekaro Elem

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Biweekly Mortgage Calculator

What is a biweekly mortgage?

Compounding frequency impact on biweekly mortgage payments

How to calculate biweekly mortgage payments

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