SMAlvarez wrote:
I need help with the following problem.
"A person is going to buy a house. The cost of the house is $300,000,
and the person is going to make a 15% down payment. The balance will be
financed with a 30-year mortgage at 6% APR, with monthly payments. Using
the PMT function, calculate the amount of the monthly payment, the total
amount paid in 30 years, and the total interest paid."

Ok I think the pmt function is PMT(.06/12,30*12,255,000)
Is that correct?

(Typo: Change "255,000" to "255000", which is what you intended.)

Perhaps; perhaps not.

First, change "255,000" to "255000", which I'm sure is what you
intended to write. Just a typo.

The primary issue is with the term "APR". That has a special meaning;
but many people misuse the term. You are assuming that 6% is the
"annual interest rate" (or nominal rate). And that might very well be
what was intended. On the other hand, "APR" might refer to the
effective "annual percentage rate" of the compounded monthly rate. If
that is the intent, ".06/12" should be replaced by RATE(12,0,-1,1+6%).
On the "third hand", for US mortgages, "APR" has a very technical
meaning that goes beyond just "the effective annual percentage rate of
the compounded monthly rate". Since you do not provide (and might not
have) sufficient information to compute the US "truth in lending" APR,
I presume that definition does not apply to this problem. Bottom line:
perhaps you should ask your teacher for clarification about what
he/she means by "6% APR".

If "6% APR" is intended to mean "6% annual interest rate", your formula
is essentially correct (after correcting the typo). But note with
those parameters, PMT will return a negative number -- which some
people will insist is indeed the correct sign of the result. If you
want a positive number (as I prefer), change that last parameter to a
negative number.

What does he mean by "Using the PMT function, calculate the amount of
the monthly payment, the total amount paid in 30 years, and the total
interest paid."?

The total amount paid is 30*12*PMT(...). The total interest paid is
the total amount paid minus the principal (255000).