Has anyone refinanced?

We are in a 30 year mortgage at a 6.0% interest rate... that is pretty bad nowadays. We could actually refinance to a 15 year (rates are about 3.9%) and only pay about $200 more per month. And be done in half the time and save a LOT of money in interst! I know it would be a smart move, but I have been so lazy about looking into it. How much would refinancing cost, and do you have to actually go to another closing? Is it true that the closing costs can be rolled into the mortgage so you don't have to pay it up front?

Thanks for any answers!

Re: Has anyone refinanced?

Your best bet is to contact your bank. Yes, you can roll the closing costs into your new mortgage. How much it costs depends on how much your mortgage is and if you end up switching banks, you'll pay the NYS mortgage recording tax again.

Yes, you have to go to another closing, but ours was quicker than the first one.

Re: Has anyone refinanced?

We are in the process of refinancing into a 15 yr mortgage. We owe about 23 yrs on the 30 yr but the interest rate we had was 5 3/8. We got held up on a snag with the title (a clerical error but everything takes forever to resolve between the different banks) and the rates have gone down even lower on the 15 yr so I'm happy for the snag. We also will continue with bimonthly (really biweekly but they call them bimonthly) and pay the same but really make 13 monthly payments a year instead of 12. Ours would also increase by about the same per month. We could pay it off a lot sooner that 15 yrs. The only negative I heard is that you want to have a mortgage payment when your kids are entering college or they see you are being able to pay through the nose vs your child getting financial aid. My oldest will be ready for college in 9 or 10 yrs but I have a feeling we will be elsewhere with another mortgage so I'm not worried.

The rate would be higher to reflect the rolled in closing costs (than the current quote from another bank) but as the PP said, the upside is it's so easy. And we have no restrictions on when we can sell.

Re: Has anyone refinanced?

We refinanced with the same bank, rolled in the closing costs and had to go to another closing. It took a few months but was definitely worth it.