Your Home Renovation May Require Some Financial Innovation. Which One Should YOU Go For – Personal Loan OR Home Loan?

Highlights

  • No cash with you to renovate your home this festive season? Consider two options - personal loan & home loan
  • A personal loan can be accessed quickly but come at a higher rate of interest compared to a home loan
  • So, choose the option carefully using the information shown in this post

Flaky walls, leaky ceilings, creaky kitchen cabinets… not the best way to welcome the festive season. The Renovation can’t come soon enough, but with mounting expenses, who has that chunk of cash lying around? Maybe, there’s a solution. If you think your house needs a coat of new ideas, and not another dose of procrastination, read on!

If chosen carefully, Loans can be a great way to avoid postponing your Home Renovation plans. Consider two options – a Personal Loan and a Home Loan

While a personal loan can be approved instantly provided you meet the eligibility criteria, a home loan can take about 10-15 days to get disbursed. So, on the procedural ease, a home loan is no match to a personal loan. But is it the same in terms of savings? Let’s compare and find out.

Comparison Begins Now

Interest Rates

While home loans come at an interest rate of 8.35%-9.50% per annum, personal loans are much costlier at 11%-20%. Lower interest rates on a home loan mean you will pay less on renovation.

Repayment Tenure

Home loans are given for a much longer tenure compared to a personal loan. While you can have a maximum of 30 years to repay the home loan, you get only 5 years (max.) to pay off your personal loan dues. The shorter tenure on a personal loan can lead you to pay more towards the Equated Monthly Installment (EMI).

The example below will show the cost difference between the two loans.

Example – If you want to renovate a 3-BHK flat in Delhi, you may have to take a loan of around ₹5 lakh. So, if you get a 5-year personal loan and a 7-year home loan of ₹5 lakh each at 15% and 8.60% interest rate, respectively, how will that show on the overall EMI and interest payments? For that, you can check out the table below.

Home loan with a longer tenure still leads to a lesser interest outgo compared to a personal loan. Usually, when the tenure is longer, the interest liability increases and vice-versa.

Tax Benefits

Home loans give you tax exemptions upto ₹1.5 lakh and ₹2 lakh on principal and interest repayments, respectively, in a financial year. These exemptions will reduce the overall outgo on renovation. In contrast, personal loans don’t have tax benefits.

So, if you want immediate funds to renovate your home, you can opt for a personal loan and get it done. However, a home loan can save more on renovation as pointed out in this post. So, the choice is yours!

Personal Loan Interest Rates March 2024
HDFC Bank10.75% - 14.50%
ICICI Bank10.75% - 19.00%
IndusInd Bank10.25% - 26.00%
Kotak Bank10.99%
RBL14.00% - 23.00%
SMFG India Credit12.00% - 24.00%
Standard Chartered Bank11.49%
Tata Capital10.50% - 24.00%
Home Loan Interest Rates March 2024
Axis Bank8.75% - 9.15%
Bank of Baroda8.50% - 10.60%
Citibank8.75% - 9.15%
HDFC8.50% - 9.40%
ICICI Bank9.00% - 9.85%
Indiabulls Housing Finance Limited8.65%
Kotak Bank8.70%
LIC Housing8.50% - 10.50%
Piramal Capital & Housing Finance10.50%
PNB Housing Finance8.50% - 10.95%
Reliance Home Finance8.75% - 14.00%
State Bank of India/SBI9.10% - 9.65%
Tata Capital8.95% - 12.00%
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