What will an FHA payment look like?

HUD sets an FHA limit for every county in the country. It is not the conforming loan limit, FHFA publishes that one separately, off different median-price data, and the two are frequently different numbers in the same county. The national FHA floor for 2026 is $541,287 and the ceiling is $1,249,125, both for a one-unit property.

The divergence can be dramatic. Honolulu County has a $1,249,125 conforming limit against an FHA limit of $828,000. Anchorage is at the conforming ceiling and the FHA floor at the same time, a gap of more than $700,000. Nashville runs the other way: its conforming limit is the $832,750 baseline while its FHA limit is $1,029,250. If a calculator gives you one national number, it is wrong in most of the country.

There is no FHA jumbo. Above the county limit, FHA is simply not available, and the loan has to be conventional, high balance or jumbo.

Source: HUD 2026 forward mortgage limits and the FHFA 2026 conforming loan limit county file. One-unit properties. Counties not listed use the national floor.

The limit applies to the base loan amount, the mortgage before any financed upfront premium. When the 1.75% upfront mortgage insurance premium is financed, it is added on top of the base amount and is excluded from the maximum mortgage calculation. The note amount can therefore exceed the county limit for that reason alone, and the loan is still perfectly within guidelines.

HUD Handbook 4000.1 puts it directly: the Base Loan Amount is “the mortgage amount prior to the addition of any financed Upfront Mortgage Insurance Premium (UFMIP)”, and “all references to maximum mortgage amount or mortgage amount shall refer to the Base Loan Amount.”

A worked example, because this is the rule most calculators get wrong. A $560,000 purchase with 3.5% down in a county at the $541,287 floor gives a base loan of $540,400, inside the limit. The financed premium of $9,457 takes the note amount to $549,857, which is above it. That loan is fine. A tool that tests the note amount instead would tell that buyer FHA is unavailable when it is not.

Two premiums, and they work differently from conventional mortgage insurance in three ways that matter. It is charged on every FHA loan regardless of down payment, including loans at 80% loan-to-value where a conventional loan would carry none. It is priced from HUD's table rather than from your credit score. And unless the loan-to-value was 90% or less at origination, it never cancels.

Upfront: 1.75% of the base loan amount, which may be financed into the loan or paid in cash. Financing it is the norm.

Annual: charged monthly, calculated on the loan amount. The $726,200 threshold in the premium table below is a fixed dollar figure written into the governing Mortgagee Letter, it does not track the current conforming loan limit, which is a common and expensive misreading.

This is the most consequential number on the page. If the loan-to-value at origination is 90% or below, the annual premium cancels after 132 payments, eleven years, whatever the property is worth by then. Above 90%, it runs for the full term of the loan.

The rule keys on the original loan-to-value and nothing afterwards. Paying the loan down does not trigger cancellation. Neither does the property appreciating, nor a new appraisal, nor reaching 78% of value the way conventional mortgage insurance does under the Homeowners Protection Act. On a life-of-loan FHA premium the only exits are paying the loan off, selling, or refinancing out of FHA, which means qualifying again, at whatever rates exist then.

The practical consequence: the difference between 3.5% down and 10% down is not really the $42,000 of down payment on a $650,000 house. It is that plus tens of thousands of dollars of mortgage insurance the 10% version never pays. The calculator above works out that figure for your scenario.

FHA permits interested parties, the seller, the builder, the agent, anyone with a financial interest in the transaction, to contribute up to 6% of the sales price toward the buyer's closing costs, prepaid items, discount points and any upfront premium paid in cash. That is a materially higher allowance than conventional financing gives at a comparable loan-to-value, where the cap is 3% above 90% loan-to-value.

Contributions above 6% require a dollar-for-dollar reduction in the sales price before the maximum mortgage is calculated. Concessions can never be applied to the down payment, the minimum required investment has to come from the borrower or an acceptable gift.

FHA finances two-, three- and four-unit homes at the same 3.5% down payment, as long as you live in one of the units for at least a year. The loan limits are considerably higher: at the national floor the one-unit limit of $541,287 becomes $693,050 for a duplex, $837,700 for a triplex and $1,041,125 for a fourplex, and at the ceiling $1,249,125 becomes $1,599,375, $1,933,200 and $2,402,625.

The calculator above covers one-unit properties only. County-level two- to four-unit limits are not a fixed multiple of the one-unit figure, and publishing derived numbers that are a few hundred dollars off is worse than publishing none. Look your county up in HUD's official tool at HUD's FHA mortgage limits lookup, then enter that figure in the “FHA limit override” box and everything else on this page will price correctly.

One further rule applies to three- and four-unit purchases and not to duplexes: the property has to be self-sufficient. The net rental income the appraiser establishes for the property, market rent reduced by a vacancy and maintenance factor, must at least cover the full mortgage payment. A triplex that does not clear that test is not an FHA loan at any price, which is why three- and four-unit deals are worth pricing with a person rather than a calculator.

The annual percentage rate is the rate that discounts every payment you make back to the amount financed, expressed as a yearly rate. It is higher than the interest rate whenever there are prepaid finance charges, which on an FHA loan is always, the upfront premium alone guarantees it. It is the figure Regulation Z requires be used to compare the cost of credit between loans.

Counted as prepaid finance charges here: origination and discount points, lender fees, prepaid per-diem interest from closing to the end of the month, and the 1.75% upfront mortgage insurance premium whether it is financed or paid in cash. Excluded, as 12 CFR 1026.4(c)(7) permits when bona fide and reasonable: title examination and title insurance, escrow and settlement fees, document preparation, notary, appraisal, credit report, survey, and recording fees and transfer taxes. The monthly premium sits in the payment stream for as long as it runs, which is why an FHA APR at 96.5% loan-to-value lands so far above its note rate, and why the same loan at 90% lands closer.

The calculation assumes you keep the loan for its full term, make every scheduled payment and never refinance or prepay; that the rate is fixed for the whole term; and that mortgage insurance terminates on the schedule shown. It is an estimate built from the fees entered above, not from an actual fee sheet, and it will differ from the APR on your Loan Estimate.

Every closing-cost figure in this tool is an estimate. It is not a Loan Estimate, a Closing Disclosure, a fee worksheet, or a quote, and it is not binding on anyone. Lender fees, title and escrow charges, settlement and recording fees, and prepaid items vary by lender, by settlement agent, by county and state, and by the day you close. Your actual figures arrive on the Loan Estimate you receive within three business days of a completed application, and are finalized on the Closing Disclosure you receive at least three business days before closing.

The estimate here is built from the down payment, points and lender fees, a single percentage of the base loan amount for title, escrow and recording, the upfront premium if you elect to pay it in cash, prepaid interest, the first year's homeowner's insurance premium, and tax and insurance reserves. It does not include: transfer, documentary, mortgage or recording taxes, which are substantial in some states and cities; HOA transfer, document or capitalization fees; home, pest, roof or sewer inspections; appraisal or credit report fees already paid outside closing; home warranty; owner's title policy where the buyer pays it by local custom; survey; flood or earthquake premiums where required; rate lock extension fees; per-diem interest differences from an actual closing date; or prorations of taxes, HOA dues, rent or utilities between buyer and seller, which can move the number in either direction.

Seller credits entered here reduce the estimate but are not verified against anything. They are subject to the 6% FHA interested-party contribution cap and may be reduced or disallowed at underwriting. Cash to close must be documented from acceptable, sourced and seasoned funds.