Payday Loan Calculator

About Payday Loan Calculator

This payday loan calculator will help you determine the actual annual percentage rate (APR) and total cost of a payday loan. It is an excellent tool to estimate or compare the cost of taking out a payday loan with an alternative loan. Financial emergencies can arise before payday, and you might not have the funds to cover the extra expenses. Maybe because you don't have enough in savings or your funds are tied up in an investment, such as a fixed deposit, or perhaps you have bad credit, or you just don't earn enough.

What is a payday loan? – Payday loan definition

A payday loan is a very short-term loan provided to a borrower on the agreement that the loan is repaid on their next payday. Lenders offer the loan as a percentage of the borrower's next paycheck, allowing them to access their wages upfront. Therefore, payday loans are also referred to as payday advance or cash advance.

Payday loan lenders usually charge a very high-interest rate because they provide loans without collateral, but the borrower gets access to the credit immediately.

Although Payday loans provide instant cash with minimal documentation in times of emergency, the trade-offs are enormous, for instance:

Borrowers may be required to repay the entire loan amount, interest, and fees at once.

Payday loans can have an annual percentage rate as high as 400%.

The annual percentage rate (APR) represents the actual interest you pay on loan yearly.

You can calculate the APR of a payday loan using the formula:

APR = ((finance charge / loan amount) × 365) / term × 100

APR = ((15/100) × 365)/14 × 100

APR = 391.07%

That means, if you borrowed $100 with a finance charge (or interest) of $15 for 14 days, if you fail to pay back the loan in the timeframe, extending into a year, you will owe over $391, excluding the monthly fees on the loan.

What are monthly fees?

Most payday loan lenders charge a fixed percentage of the outstanding loan amount as a monthly fee. The monthly fee is designed to further reduce their risk and improve their return on investment (ROI) on the loan. Usually, the fee ranges from 4% to 10% of the outstanding loan balance every 30 days. This means that every 30 days from the first day you take a payday loan, you get to pay a monthly fee on the loan balance. If you take the loan for less than 30 days, you pay the monthly fee once, but if it extends beyond 30 days – even by a day – you pay another monthly fee. So make sure you also look out for how much percentage a lender charges as a fee, not just the finance charge or interest on the loan!

We need not emphasize that taking out a payday loan to cover a non-emergency item such as a luxury purchase or a vacation makes less financial sense than saving up your funds over time.