One of the most important factors you need to decide upon when choosing a loan is the loan repayment term.

Once you've decided how much you want to borrow, you need to work out how long you need to take to pay it back.

The main considerations are fairly obvious.

The quicker you pay the debt off, the less interest you will pay (so the loan will be cheaper) and the less time you will spend in debt (which is important to some).

However, the quicker you commit to paying a loan off, the higher the monthly repayments will be and the more you will be stretched.

Additionally, your repayment term is affected by the type of loan you choose. You can borrow up to £25,000 with both an unsecured personal loan and a secured homeowner loan, but with a homeowner loan you can opt for a repayment period up to 25 years, compared to just 10 years with an unsecured loan.

Be realistic. First work out how much you can afford on a monthly basis, and then work out how long you need to pay off the loan.

You may find our loan calculator helpful.

Repayment terms - other stuff

A couple of other things to look for in terms of repayment.

First, if there is a chance you will be in a position to pay the loan off early then make sure that you check whether the loan has an early redemption penalty. Early redemption penalties are, in effect, a penalty for paying the loan off early and denying the lender their full interest repayments.

Second, if you are feeling cautious you might want to plump for a lender which offers the opportunity to take a loan repayment window, or similar flexible terms.

Now use the Loan Genie loans search tool to find the loan for you!