In these days of low interest rates, many homeowners have taken advantage of refinancing to save money on their mortgage. But there are other ways to save money and reduce the number of years you make payments. Michael Holigan is About The House with a plan that can work for anyone... WITHOUT refinancing.

Michael Holigan: Paulette Gonyea doesn't want to spend the next 30 years making house payments. So she and her husband are trying to shave some time off their mortgage.

Paulette Gonyea (Homeowner): On our mortgage payment there is a small line that says "X" amount you want to put just towards the principle. You pay your mortgage payment, regular price, and then you put a certain amount down just towards the principle of it. And that's what we do.

MH: Just like the Gonyeas, there are millions of other people who are doing the same thing, chipping in a little extra when they can. But there's a better way that will save you more money and more time. It's called a bi-weekly mortgage. Say you borrow $95,000 at 8% interest over 30 years. Your principle and interest payments would be $697 a month for a total of $8,364 a year. With a bi-weekly mortgage you would pay half the monthly payment or $348.50 every other week. That would total $9,061 for the year. That's the equivalent of one extra payment. Since your loan is amortized on a bi-weekly basis, you save more money than you would by simply making one additional payment a year. Depending on your interest rate, this type of mortgage can reduce the length of your loan by as much as 7 years.

PG: We want to pay "X" amount of payments and maybe get the mortgage, 30 year mortgage down to 20 years. That's retirement age for us.

MH: Bi-weekly mortgages shorten the length of your note and build equity at a faster rate.

I'm Michael Holigan, About The House.