The second price of buying a home
The down payment gets all the attention, but closing costs are the second cheque you write — typically 2–5% of the home price — covering the lender's, insurer's, attorney's and government's work of creating your loan and transferring the property. This calculator itemizes the usual lines with typical amounts pre-filled for the example home, and every line is editable: replace them with the figures from your lender's Loan Estimate and the total, the percentage of price, and your full cash needed at closing update instantly.
Some lines scale with the loan (the origination fee is often 1% of the loan amount), some scale with the price (title insurance is often around 0.5%), and some are flat fees (appraisal, inspection, recording). The pre-filled defaults follow those rules for a $350,000 home with a $280,000 loan — edit freely for your own deal.
Which costs can you shop for?
Not every line is fixed. Lender fees (origination, underwriting, processing) vary by lender and are partly negotiable; title and settlement services can be shopped in most states; and sellers sometimes contribute toward closing costs as part of the negotiation. The lines you generally cannot change are government recording fees and prepaid escrows — the tax and insurance deposits your lender collects up front are your own money held in reserve, not a fee, but they are still cash you must have on the day.
Worked example
For the default example — a $350,000 home, $280,000 loan, 20% down — the twelve pre-filled lines total $11,010, about 3.1% of the price. Add the $70,000 down payment and the cash needed at closing is $81,010. First-time buyers are routinely surprised by that second figure; seeing it itemized, months before the closing table, is the entire point of this page.
How to use this calculator
- Enter the home price, the loan amount, and your down payment percent.
- Walk each line and replace the defaults with your Loan Estimate figures where you have them.
- Read the total closing costs, the percent of price, and the cash to close in the green panel.
- Zero out any line your lender or seller is covering, and watch the total fall.
- Cross-check the monthly payment with the Mortgage Calculator once the cash side is settled.
Beware the too-good estimate
Online estimates of closing costs often omit the prepaid escrow deposits — several months of property tax and insurance collected at closing — which can be the single largest line. They are included here (the “escrow deposit” line) because cash you must bring is cash you must bring, whatever it is called. When you compare lenders, compare the same full list: a low-fee loan that quietly skips the escrows is not cheaper.