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The Excel CUMIPMT Function

Related Functions:
CUMPRINC
IPMT

Function Description

The Excel CUMIPMT function calculates the cumulative interest paid on a loan or investment, between two specified periods.

The syntax of the function is:

CUMIPMT( rate, nper, pv, start_period, end_period, type )

Where the arguments are as follows:

rate - The interest rate, per period.
nper - The number of periods over which the loan or investment is to be paid.
pv - The present value of the loan/investment.
start_period - The number of the first period over which the interest is to be calculated (must be an integer between 1 and nper).
end_period - The number of the last period over which the interest is to be calculated (must be an integer between 1 and nper).
type -

An integer (equal to 0 or 1) that specifies whether the payment is made at the start or the end of the period:

0   -   the payment is made at the end of the period;
1   -   the payment is made at the start of the period.


Cash Flow Sign Convention:

Note that, in line with the general cash flow sign convention, cash outflows are represented by negative numbers and cash inflows are represented by positive numbers. This is seen in the example below.


Excel Cumipmt Function Example

In the following spreadsheet, the Excel Cumipmt function is used to calculate the cumulative interest paid during each year of a loan of $50,000 which is to be paid off over 5 years. Interest is charged at a rate of 5% per year and the payment to the loan is to be made at the end of each month.

 Formulas:
  A B
1 Cumulative interest during each year of a loan
of $50,000 that is to be paid off over 5 years,
with an interest rate of 5% per year (payment is
made at the end of each month):
2 Yr1: =CUMIPMT( 5%/12, 60, 50000, 1, 12, 0 )
3 Yr2: =CUMIPMT( 5%/12, 60, 50000, 13, 24, 0 )
4 Yr3: =CUMIPMT( 5%/12, 60, 50000, 25, 36, 0 )
5 Yr4: =CUMIPMT( 5%/12, 60, 50000, 37, 48, 0 )
6 Yr5: =CUMIPMT( 5%/12, 60, 50000, 49, 60, 0 )
 Results:
  A B
1 Cumulative interest during each year of a loan
of $50,000 that is to be paid off over 5 years,
with an interest rate of 5% per year (payment is
made at the end of each month):
2 Yr1: -$2,294.98
3 Yr2: -$1,833.10
4 Yr3: -$1,347.59
5 Yr4: -$837.24
6 Yr5: -$300.79

Note that in this example:


For further examples of the Excel Cumipmt function, see the Microsoft Office website.


Cumipmt Function Errors

If you get an error from the Excel Cumipmt function, this is likely to be one of the following:

Common Errors
#NUM! -

Occurs if either:

  • The supplied start_period or end_period is ≤0 or is > nper;
  • The supplied start_period > end_period;
  • Any of the supplied rate, nper or pv arguments are ≤ 0;
  • The supplied type argument is not equal to 0 or 1.
#VALUE! - Occurs if any of the supplied arguments are not recognised as numeric values.

Also, the following problem is encountered by some users:

Common Problem

The result from the Excel Cumipmt function is much higher or much lower than expected.

Possible Reason

When calculating monthly or quarterly payments, many users forget to convert annual interest rates or the number of periods to months or quarters.

Solve this problem by ensuring that the rate and the nper arguments are expressed in the correct units. I.e.:

months = 12 * years
quarters = 4 * years 		monthly rate = annual rate / 12
quarterly rate = annual rate / 4
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