A personal loan calculator can be an invaluable tool for planning out your financial strategy going into the future. The key is to make sure you’re getting the best tool for what you need. Here are some major elements that every personal loan calculator worth its salt should have.
Personal Loan Calculator Features
State Interest Calculations
Loan calculation is a lot easier if the personal loan calculator allows you to enter the state you operate in and automatically takes that interest into account. The more you have to look up little extra things like this, the more you’re going to be stressed out. The more stressed out you are, the more you’re going to make mistakes. The entire purpose of these calculators is to try and reduce how much stress you have, after all, not make it worse.
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Relevant Links Based on Results
Once you add in all of your information, it certainly helps if the personal loan calculator, and the site in general, can then give you recommendations for loans based on all the detail that you just added in. That way you don’t have to add all of it in again later on different sites. You should still do your due diligence for each loan quote that comes up, but it makes good sense to simplify things in this way in order to reduce extra stress and time spent on your part.
Ideally, the links should include extra information, such as information about the particular company and how well they are reviewed, either by the calculator site itself or by other third-party sites. It’s also nice when it gives you a range of likely rates for each even before you click to get a quote or to check the specific rates. This way, you have everything you need all together in one place!
Credit Score
Your credit score is obviously going to have a huge effect on what kind of rates you get, and while you can just enter the rate directly if you really want to calculate the odds of getting a certain loan, it definitely helps to have an option to account for your score in some way. After all, this could make a huge difference regarding what rates are likely going to be even possible given what your score is. It’s important to stay grounded in reality.
In general, it should be easy to check between Excellent, Good, Fair and Bad ratings, all with the scores attached so you know that you’re on the same page.
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Graphs and Sharing
It’s important that the personal loan calculator you use displays information in a way that you can easily understand and even send to others. With a “share” option, rather than trying to take a picture or screenshot of the graph, you can share it directly through whatever means you prefer. There’s usually the option to send links, for example. That way, you can send the link to someone that you trust in order to get their take on whether the kind of loan that you’ve come up with is going to be a good bet in your particular situation or not.
Additionally, you can often get graphs in the following forms:
- Pie: Depending on the setup, you could get graphs that show how much of your total income per month is going to go to the loan.
- Bar: A bar graph can show you the relative rates for different loans, as well as for other information.
- Others: The possibilities for displaying information are nearly infinite here, and the key is to go for a calculator that has all of the information you want and that displays it in a way that makes sense to you.
Loan Term and Other Standard Factors
You should be able to select the loan term easily, regardless of how exactly this is done. Some personal loan calculators will let you put the exact number in, while others will have a dropdown menu. However, any calculator that doesn’t let you easily put in the amount, rate, and term is definitely not worth sticking with in general. You should find the personal loan calculator that has these factors instead since it will be far easier to use.
Overall, if you look for a personal loan calculator that has these particular characteristics, it should go a long way to making sure you end up with a quality tool that will give you as much help as you’re going to want in planning everything out. You definitely don’t want to end up with a tool that barely helps. Finding the right loan is often a stressful affair, after all; you want to make it as easy as possible.
