The calculators here are free, need no sign-up, and run entirely in your browser. Nothing you type is sent to us unless you specifically ask us to save it. That means you can put your real numbers in without wondering where they end up.
This is a short guide to what each field means, which ones actually move the answer, and the two places the result is easy to misread.
Start in Simple mode
The break calculator opens on four fields, and those four do most of the work.
How much you originally borrowed rather than what you owe now. We work the current balance out from your rate, start date and payment schedule. That's deliberate: most people don't have their exact balance to hand, and the figure printed on a statement is usually out of date by the time you look at it.
Your current interest rate, as written on your mortgage documents.
When your mortgage started. This one matters more than it looks. It tells us how much you've already paid off, and how much of your term is left — which in turn decides how a penalty gets calculated.
The new rate you've been offered. If you haven't been quoted anything yet, use the figure from our rates page, which is derived daily from Government of Canada bond yields.
That's enough for a real answer. Everything else has a sensible Canadian default behind it: five-year term, twenty-five year amortization, monthly payments.
Reading the result
The headline is the estimated saving, compared against the threshold you set on the slider. Under it sit the numbers that actually explain the answer.
The estimated break penalty is the one people care about, and the one with the most uncertainty. If your mortgage is variable, it's usually three months of interest, which is fairly predictable. If it's fixed, lenders normally charge the greater of three months' interest and an interest rate differential — and the IRD depends on your lender's posted rates and the specific wording of your contract. We show both figures and which one applied, so you can see how close the call was.
If you stay and if you break sit side by side: your payment, the interest over the rest of your term, what you'd still owe at the end, and the total. Comparing the two columns is usually more informative than the headline number.
The first thing that's easy to misread
A lower payment is not the same as a saving.
If you break a mortgage and restart the amortization at twenty-five years, your payment drops — but partly because you've just added years of payments, not because the rate improved. On a typical scenario, roughly a third of the apparent monthly saving can come from stretching the loan back out rather than from the better rate.
We default to keeping your current amortization for exactly that reason. If you switch it off in Advanced mode, the result panel splits the payment drop into the part that came from the rate and the part that came from borrowing for longer. Look at that split before deciding you're better off.
The second thing that's easy to misread
Paying less over the term and being better off are not the same thing either.
Break a mortgage and you'll usually pay less each month, but you may owe more at the end. The result panel states both: how much less you pay over the comparison window, and how much more you owe when it closes. The saving figure already nets these off, but it's worth seeing the two halves rather than trusting one number.
What Advanced mode adds
Switch to Advanced when you know more than the defaults assume.
Today's market rate for your remaining term is the one worth getting right on a fixed mortgage. An IRD is measured against your lender's current rate for a term matching what's left — with two years to run, that's their two-year rate, not the rate you'd refinance at. Those are different numbers and the gap between them changes the penalty materially.
Penalty method lets you override the standard calculation if your contract says something unusual. Most people should leave it alone.
Comparison window sets how far ahead to compare. End of your original term is the most like-for-like view, because it's the point where both paths would face renewal anyway.
Adding the penalty to the new mortgage is a real choice with a real cost — you finance it, so you pay interest on it. The checkbox makes that visible rather than assuming it.
The savings threshold
The slider isn't decoration. Breaking a mortgage means legal fees, paperwork and a few weeks of admin. A nine-hundred-dollar saving isn't worth that to most people; a nineteen-thousand-dollar one probably is. Where the line sits is a judgment about your time, not a calculation, so you make it.
It also sets the trigger for rate alerts, if you use them.
The payment calculator
The second tab answers a simpler question: what a mortgage costs. Home price and interest rate get you a payment, total interest and total cost. Advanced mode adds down payment, amortization and payment frequency.
It's useful for a purchase, or for sanity-checking what a different amortization does to the total. Note how much total interest moves when you change the amortization by five years — that number surprises most people.
Printing it
Both tabs have a Print / Save as PDF button, and the print layout is built for paper rather than being a screenshot of a dark panel. Taking the numbers to a broker or your lender is the whole point, and a printed page is easier to talk through than a phone screen.
What the numbers can't do
They can't tell you your actual penalty. Only your lender can, and they'll produce a payout statement if you ask. For a fixed mortgage the real figure can differ from any estimate by a lot.
They also can't tell you whether you'd qualify for the rate you entered. That depends on your income, your credit, the property, and whether the mortgage is insured.
Treat a promising result as a reason to make that call, not as a substitute for it. And if the answer comes back "not worth it", that's a real answer too — knowing your current mortgage still makes sense is worth something on its own.