Refinance Loans to Lower Interest Rates and Payments!     Calculate Your Savings When interest rates are  falling, take advantage of the dip to refinance your existing business debt and put more dollars in your pocket. Of course, you can check to see if your bank can trim the interest rate on your mortgage by two or more percentage points. The loan origination fee and other closing costs may work out to a few points, but you might be able to recoup this amount in less than a year because of the interest rate savings. But don't stop there. If cash flow isn’t a problem for your company, consider a different arrangement. Instead of reducing your monthly payments, refinance to reduce the term of your mortgage. Because of the lower interest rate, you may pay off your mortgage faster while keeping the same monthly payments. A rule of thumb: If you own mortgaged real estate or other property that you expect to keep for at least two years, refinance when rates drop by 2 percent. That way, you can reduce your monthly mortgage payments. Depending on the number of years left on the loan, you could end up saving thousands of dollars. Sometimes, businesses can profit by getting creative. For example, one medical group practice financed its own office building several years ago with a $1 million mortgage at 10 percent. When rates dropped below 8 percent, they explored some refinancing options. One of the partners in the practice owned a home with more than $1 million in equity. The bank was more than happy to finance the doctor’s residence. The doctor used the $1 million he borrowed on his home at 7 percent to pay off the 10 percent loan on the office building. The savings — 3 percent of $1 million — equaled $30,000 a year. The doctor’s loan origination fee and other closing costs came to roughly 2 and 1/2 points or $25,000. In the first few years, the physician more than recouped these charges from his interest savings. Indeed, considering the 25-year term of the new mortgage, the effective annual cost of the refinancing was only $1,000 per year. So look at all your credit costs on buildings, machinery, equipment, inventory, accounts receivable and lines of credit to determine if you can save by refinancing. Call Ronald J. Cappuccio, J.D., LL.M.(Tax) at (856) 665-2121 to review all loan documents, as well as rates and collateral reported in the footnotes to your financial statements. Sometimes, we can negotiate terms that reduce the collateral if you make loan payments promptly for a certain period. Always question the rates your bank offers you. Many people think that prime rates are for prime customers only. This is not the case. Try asking for the London Inter Bank Offered Rates (LIBOR), which are often cheaper than prime rates for a bigger customer with good credit.