Thank you finding the error of my way. ANd for your quick response, that
saved me an embarrasing moment later today.

"Niek Otten" wrote:

First, Present value and payments must have opposite signs.

It seems to me that your known values are not correct.

Both with Exel's NPER function and with a monthly table, my result is that the loan will have been paid in 161.6009757 months.
180 months require a monthly payment of 445.9272.

--
Kind regards,

Niek Otten
Microsoft MVP - Excel



"JR Hester" wrote in message ...
| Excel XP on WinXP
|
| First let me say that maybe I just don't understand financial functions,
| although I have done amortizations in the past.
|
| I am having trouble understanding what is happening with the NPER function
| recently.
|
| Using the NPER function gave me disappointing results for a calulation I was
| making. I decided to test the function ( and my use of it) against a known
| value-- A current mortgage. Mortgage amt 50,000, rate 6.875% and term of 15
| years with a monthly payment of $475.25. I used the formula =NPER(6.88%/12,
| 475.25, 50000, 0). This returned -82.56, which is a long way from the 180
| monthly payments my mortgage is scheduled to include.
|
| There must be an error in my execution of the NPER function, but I can't
| seem to see where its at. Or am I totally misunderstanding the purpose of
| thsi function.
|
| Any light you can shed on this for me will be greatly appreciated.
|
| Thanks to all participants in the Excel Community