Refinance Your Florida Mortgage

Every way to refinance a mortgage in Florida: lower the rate, shorten the term, take cash out, or get rid of mortgage insurance.

Ways to refinance a mortgage in Florida

• Rate and term: lower the rate or change the length, with no cash taken
• Cash out: borrow against equity and receive the difference
• FHA streamline: no appraisal, for existing FHA borrowers
• VA IRRRL: no appraisal, for existing VA borrowers
• Removing mortgage insurance, which is often the largest saving of all

Start with the break-even, not the rate

Divide your total closing costs by the monthly saving. Costs of $4,800 against a $180 saving means 27 months to recover. Keep the loan past that point and you are ahead. Move before it and you funded a lower rate you never collected.

Therefore the first question is how long you intend to stay, not what rate you can get. Anyone quoting a rate without asking that has skipped the part that decides whether this is worth doing.

The Florida-specific reason to refinance right now

Many owners here are focused on rates and missing a larger saving sitting in their mortgage insurance.

If you hold an FHA loan taken with 3.5% down, that annual premium runs for the life of the loan and no streamline removes it. Meanwhile Florida values have risen substantially for most owners since 2021. Once you hold 20% equity, refinancing into a conventional loan ends the insurance entirely.

On a $350,000 balance that premium runs roughly $160 a month, or about $1,900 a year. Consequently a conventional refinance at a slightly higher rate can beat a streamline that trims a quarter point and keeps the insurance. Compare the total payments rather than the rates.

Owners on conventional loans have an easier route still. You may not need to refinance at all, since you can request PMI cancellation at 80% loan-to-value based on a current appraisal. That costs a few hundred dollars rather than a full set of closing costs.

Two costs to watch

Resetting the clock is the first. Refinancing into a fresh 30-year loan seven years into your current one commits you to 37 years of payments on the same house. Ask for a term matching what remains instead, since most lenders will quote it.

Florida taxes are the second. Documentary stamp tax applies to the new note, though intangible tax applies only to any increase in the balance, so a straight rate and term refinance avoids most of it. Ask your title company about the reissue rate as well, which discounts the title policy when your existing one is recent enough.

Read the full refinancing guide for the detail.

Figures above are illustrative. Florida documentary stamp and intangible taxes follow Chapters 199 and 201, Florida Statutes. PMI cancellation rights come from the Homeowners Protection Act; the CFPB explains them here.