Cash-Out Refinance
The third way to reach your equity.
A cash-out refinance replaces your entire mortgage with a new, larger one — and hands you the difference at closing. It is the right tool surprisingly often, and the wrong one just as often, because its price is repricing every dollar you already owe. This page is the honest comparison: cash-out, fixed second, or line of credit — and which one your situation actually calls for.
Who reaches for equity — and what they reach for
The remodel
A kitchen, a roof, an addition with a contractor’s quote attached. A defined project with a defined number — sometimes best served by replacing the loan, sometimes by leaving it alone.
The unexpected expense
Medical, family, a business moment that will not wait. When the money is needed once and soon, the speed of the route matters as much as its price.
Consolidating debt
Cards and loans that cost far more than mortgage money — retiring them at mortgage pricing can cut total interest dramatically over the years. The honest footnote below is about making sure it stays that way.
The rate-holder
If the mortgage you have is one you could not replace today, read the fixed-second and HELOC pages first. Replacing a loan you love is the most expensive way to reach equity — and half this page exists to say so.
Not sure which of the three doors is yours? That is the whole conversation, and it turns on your current mortgage more than on your credit.
Talk it throughThree doors to the same equity, and they are not interchangeable
A cash-out reprices every dollar you owe — not just the cash you take. That one fact decides most of these.
Same goal — your equity in your hands. Three very different machines:
The decision usually turns on one question: what happens to the mortgage you already have? If replacing it costs you nothing you care about, the cash-out’s simplicity is hard to beat. If your current loan is one you would mourn, the second and the line exist precisely so you never have to touch it. That single fork sorts most files in the first ten minutes.
| Cash-out refinance | Replaces the whole loan | One payment, the largest reach into equity on some programs — and every dollar you owe gets today’s pricing. |
| Fixed second mortgage | Sits behind your loan | Your first mortgage stays untouched. One fixed sum, one fixed, predictable payment, a fixed end date. |
| HELOC | Revolves behind your loan | Tap equity when you need it — draw, repay, draw again. The rate moves with the market, and the line stays open. |
Comparative descriptions are structural, not offers. Fixed second mortgages and lines of credit are separate programs with their own pages, grids and requirements on this site. Not all applicants will qualify for any given route.
How it actually works
One loan out, one bigger loan in, cash at the closing table.
Your current mortgage is paid off
Entirely. The new loan replaces it — new terms on everything, not just on the cash you take.
The new loan is sized against your equity
Appraised value times the program’s ceiling, minus what you owe: that is the cash available. The grids below show how far each program reaches.
You qualify like any refinance
Income, credit, ratios — the full file, on whichever documentation route fits you, including the bank-statement and 1099 routes elsewhere on this site.
The difference arrives at closing
One wire, one new payment, one loan. Simplicity is this tool’s genuine advantage — and repricing the whole balance is its genuine cost.
How far it reaches — and when it wins
Two tables decide a cash-out: how far the routes actually reach, and whether this is even the right tool for your situation.
The current program set on this shelf. A primary residence unless the row says otherwise — and the conforming route answers for a rental and a second home too, which surprises most people:
| The route | Maximum financing after cash-out | Condition |
|---|---|---|
| Conventional cash-out | 80% | From 580 under the conforming rules — the everyday route |
| Conventional — a two-to-four-unit home you live in | 75% | From 580, same conforming rules |
| Conventional — a second home | 75% | From 580, one unit |
| Conventional — an investment property | 75% | From 580 on one unit; 70% on two to four |
| FHA cash-out | 80% | With FHA’s documentation flexibility and credit posture |
| VA cash-out | Up to 100% | For eligible veterans — the deepest reach in lending; the VA page holds the full grids |
Twelve months of clean mortgage history is the practical gate on all three, and the non-QM shelf runs its own cash-out grids — the tab to the right collects the routes that answer a self-employed file, a credit score in the 500s, a second home or a rental, and the bank-statement, DSCR and jumbo pages each publish theirs in full, including routes for self-employed files and investment property. For comparison: the routes that leave your first mortgage alone reach further than most people expect — the fixed-second and HELOC pages publish combined ceilings up to ninety percent on a primary residence. Deeper reach without replacing anything is exactly why those pages exist.
Representative of one program’s conforming product summary v26.6 published 06/25/2026, FHA refinance summaries published 06/25/2026, and VA refinance summary published 06/25/2026; primary-residence one-unit figures. VA cash-out availability and maximum financing depend on eligibility, entitlement and program type. Maximum financing, credit minimums and program requirements are separate limits shown only in combinations that appear together in each source. Seasoning and payment-history requirements apply. Not all applicants will qualify.
Three honest verdicts — each one sometimes correct:
| The situation | The usual winner | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Your current mortgage is unremarkable | Cash-out refinance | Nothing worth protecting means the simplest tool wins: one loan, one payment, the whole file refreshed at once. |
| Your current mortgage is worth keeping | Fixed second | A defined sum for a defined purpose, a predictable payment — and the loan you are proud of stays exactly as it is. |
| The need arrives in stages | HELOC | A renovation in phases, tuition by the semester, a business that breathes — draw as it comes due instead of borrowing it all on day one. |
And one verdict that outranks the other three: on a consolidation, the tool matters less than the discipline. Rolling cards into any of these converts unsecured debt into debt secured by your home — powerful when the spending that built the balance is finished, dangerous when it is not. I will say which applies out loud, because that sentence is worth more than any grid on this page.
Verdicts are general tendencies, not advice for any specific file; the right route depends on your full situation, existing loan, and the programs you qualify for. Debt consolidation reduces neither the amount owed nor, by itself, total cost over time; failure to repay a loan secured by your home puts the home at risk.
The three routes above are the agency answer, and for a primary residence they are hard to beat — nothing on my shelf reaches further than a VA cash-out. But they answer one borrower: a W-2 file on a home you live in. Here is what answers the rest:
| The file | Maximum financing after cash-out | Condition |
|---|---|---|
| A credit score in the 500s | 60% | From a 500 score — full documentation, and no cap on the cash you take |
| Self-employed — 12 or 24 months of bank statements | 80% | From 700 to $1 million; 70% holds down to a 640 score |
| No income and no employment stated at all | 60% | From 620, to $2 million — a primary residence or a second home; the full ladder to $3 million is on its own page |
| A large balance | 80% | To $1.5 million from 700 — and the ladder keeps writing to $6 million at lower leverage |
| A second home | 80% | From a 660 score, to $2 million |
| An investment property | 80% | From 700, to $1 million — the DSCR page holds the full investor ladder |
| A rental, owned by a foreign national | 60% | No US credit score required at all, to $1.5 million |
Two of those rows deserve more than a line. The 500-score route is the deepest credit door I have, and it is deliberately narrow: thirty-year fixed only, escrows required, two separate valuations, five years since any major credit event and no second event allowed, US citizens and permanent residents only. It is also not available everywhere — New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Cook County in Illinois, Alaska, Hawaii and Texas home-equity refinances are all outside it. What it does carry is no limit on the cash you walk away with, which is unusual at any score. The no-income route is a consumer no-ratio loan from a certified community lender, and it requires homeowner education counseling on every transaction — not a formality, a condition of closing. On the alt-doc ladder, cash in hand is unlimited at or under sixty percent and caps at a million and a half above it. And if you file taxes with an ITIN rather than a Social Security number, there is a cash-out route for you as well — the ITIN page is the honest place for it, because the grid I hold is due a refresh and I would rather price it live than publish a stale number.
Each row is a different program and the figures never combine; each is representative of that program’s own published matrix. In row order, effective dates: 06/08/2026, 06/16/2026, 03/16/2026, 08/01/2026, 07/10/2026, 06/16/2026 and 08/01/2026. Primary-residence figures except where a second home or investment property is named. Maximum financing, credit score and loan amount are separate limits shown only in combinations printed together in each source, and each program carries its own reserve, seasoning, property and occupancy rules. Several of these programs publish state restrictions and one is unavailable in seven states and Texas home-equity refinances as described above; state availability is confirmed per file. Cash-out seasoning and payment-history requirements apply throughout. Not all applicants or properties will qualify.
Keeping your first mortgage instead? The fixed second lives here →
The fine print that decides these files
What you actually hand over
Your current mortgage statement
The starting line: balance, history, escrow status. The loan must be current.
Income, by whichever route fits
Full documentation, bank statements, 1099s — the same menu as any loan on this site.
The appraisal
The number everything scales from. On a cash-out, expect a full appraisal more often than not.
A use-of-funds conversation
Not bureaucracy — strategy. Consolidations, renovations and business uses each change which tool and which program price best.
Want the exact list for your file before you ever apply? Build your document checklist — the list changes with your answers, printable and yours to keep.
Where it wins — and the honest limits
Told straight, because this page is useless otherwise.
Balances built at credit-card and personal-loan pricing can be paid off inside a mortgage instead — which is where the real long-run interest saving comes from. It only holds if those balances stay retired; running them back up leaves you with both.
Nothing is left sitting behind anything. For a borrower whose current mortgage is unremarkable, that simplicity is genuinely hard to beat.
Of the three doors, the cash-out is the one that can pull the most equity on certain routes — worth checking before assuming a second lien is the bigger tool.
Term, structure and the loan itself are all rewritten in one transaction, rather than layering something new on top of something old.
The fixed second and the HELOC exist so you never have to trade a loan you love for access to your own equity. Read those pages first; this one will still be here.
Modest needs are usually served better behind your mortgage than by replacing it — the costs of a full refinance do not shrink just because the cash-out does.
Selling within a couple of years? The costs of replacing the loan may never earn themselves back. The line or the second usually suits a short chapter better.
If the balances will rebuild, securing them against the house made things worse, not better. That is not a lecture — it is the one honest warning this industry owes people.
Run the three-way math
Tell me your balance, roughly what the house is worth, and what the money is for. Ten minutes gets you all three tools priced against each other — including the one that means not touching the mortgage you have. And if the goal is being done with it sooner rather than borrowing against it, the fastest way out puts the common acceleration strategies side by side and shows which one gets there soonest for the least interest.
Questions people actually ask
Open the full Q&A — the repricing, the costs, and the fine points ▾
+How much cash can I actually get?
Appraised value times the program ceiling, minus your payoff. The conventional and FHA routes reach 80% of value on a primary residence; VA reaches further for eligible veterans; and the non-QM routes publish their own grids for self-employed and investor files. The subtraction takes one conversation.
+Is it better than a HELOC or a second mortgage?
It is different, not better. The fork: a cash-out reprices everything you owe in exchange for one simple loan; the second and the line leave your first mortgage untouched in exchange for a second payment. Which trade wins depends on the mortgage you have now — that is the first thing we look at.
+Can I do this with bank statements instead of tax returns?
Yes. Cash-out exists across the documentation menu — bank statements, 1099s, even DSCR on rentals where your income never enters the file. The self-employed pages publish their cash-out grids.
+Can I take cash out of a rental property?
Yes — the DSCR and jumbo pages publish investment cash-out grids, and the property’s rent can carry the file. Investor cash-outs run at lower ceilings than a primary residence, and business-purpose rules apply.
+Does consolidating my cards into my mortgage actually save money?
Done right, it is one of the most effective moves in consumer finance: balances that cost far more than mortgage money get retired at mortgage pricing, and the interest saved over the years can be substantial. The honest other half: it converts unsecured debt into debt secured by your home, and the savings only hold if the balances stay retired. When the spending is finished and the plan is real — powerful. When it is not, it moves the danger to your house. I will tell you which one I see.
+How soon after buying can I take cash out?
Programs want seasoning — commonly twelve months of clean history, with some routes counting from your purchase date. Recently completed cash-outs can also block the next one for a while. Bring the dates and we will map it.
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Loan programs, explained honestly
Cash-out refinance programs are offered through third-party lenders, are subject to lender approval and full underwriting, and change without notice. Figures reflect the cited program’s conforming, FHA and VA refinance materials published 06/25/2026; program availability, maximum financing, seasoning and payment-history requirements vary by program and are separate limits shown only in combinations that appear together in each source. A cash-out refinance replaces your existing mortgage in full and reprices the entire balance; closing costs apply to the new loan. Comparative references to second mortgages and home equity lines of credit describe separate programs with their own pages and requirements. Debt consolidation converts unsecured debt into debt secured by your home; failure to repay puts the home at risk. Not all applicants or properties will qualify. This is not a commitment to lend. Equal Housing Opportunity.