# How Much Home Loan Can I Get on My Salary? > Lenders cap your EMIs at a share of income. Here's how to work backwards from your salary to the home loan amount you can realistically borrow. _By emi.me Editorial · Updated 2026-06-25_ Source: https://emi.me/blog/how-much-home-loan-can-i-get-on-my-salary/ --- You walk into a bank dreaming of a ₹70 lakh flat, and the loan officer asks one question that quietly decides everything: *what do you take home each month?* Not your CTC, not your gross — your net, in-hand salary. From that single number, the lender works backwards to a loan amount, and it is often smaller than you'd hoped. The good news: you can run the same arithmetic yourself, before you ever fill in an application. Once you understand the rule lenders use, your eligibility stops being a mystery and becomes a number you can plan around. ## The rule lenders actually use: FOIR Banks don't lend against your salary directly. They lend against the *slice of your salary that's still free* after your existing commitments. The tool they use is the **FOIR** — the Fixed Obligation to Income Ratio. In plain terms, a lender will allow your **total monthly EMIs** (the new home loan plus any car loan, personal loan, or credit-card EMIs you already pay) to reach only about **50–60% of your net monthly income**. The exact cap varies by lender, your profile, and the loan size — so always confirm the figure with your lender — but 50% is a sensible, conservative anchor for planning. That leftover slice is your **affordable EMI**. And your affordable EMI, combined with the interest rate and tenure, is what determines the loan amount. ### Why existing EMIs hurt so much Here's the part people underestimate. If you already pay a ₹15,000 car-loan EMI, that ₹15,000 comes straight off the top of your FOIR budget. On a ₹1,00,000 income with a 50% cap, your total EMI room is ₹50,000 — but the car loan eats ₹15,000, leaving only ₹35,000 for the home loan. Less room means a smaller eligible loan. Clearing a small loan before you apply can genuinely raise the house you qualify for. ## Working backwards: from EMI to loan amount Let's reverse the usual direction. Instead of "here's my loan, what's my EMI?", we ask "here's my affordable EMI, how big a loan does it support?" Take a clean case: **net income ₹1,00,000/month, no other EMIs, 50% FOIR.** That gives an affordable EMI of **₹50,000**. At an interest rate of **8.5% over 20 years (240 months)**, that ₹50,000 EMI supports a home loan of about **₹57,61,542**. That's the headline number. Now watch how the levers move it. ### The tenure lever Stretch the *same* ₹50,000 EMI over **30 years (360 months)** instead of 20, and the supportable loan jumps to about **₹65,02,682** — roughly ₹7.4 lakh more eligibility, for the identical monthly outgo. It's tempting to grab the bigger number. But a longer tenure means you pay interest for ten extra years, and the **total interest balloons** even though the monthly EMI hasn't changed. A longer tenure raises how much you *can* borrow; it does not make the loan cheaper. We break this trade-off down in [how loan tenure affects your EMI](/learn/how-loan-tenure-affects-emi/) and in the deep dive on [the real cost of a longer tenure](/blog/the-real-cost-of-a-longer-tenure/). ### The income lever Eligibility scales with the slice of income you can commit. A couple of worked points, all at a 50% FOIR with no other EMIs: | Net monthly income | Affordable EMI (50%) | Rate | Tenure | Eligible loan (approx.) | |---|---|---|---|---| | ₹1,00,000 | ₹50,000 | 8.5% | 20 years | ₹57,61,542 | | ₹1,00,000 | ₹50,000 | 8.5% | 30 years | ₹65,02,682 | | ₹75,000 | ₹37,500 | 8.5% | 20 years | ₹43,21,156 | | ₹50,000 | ₹25,000 | 9.0% | 20 years | ₹27,78,624 | Two things jump out. First, eligibility roughly tracks income — a ₹75,000 earner on the same terms qualifies for about ₹43 lakh against the ₹1,00,000 earner's ₹57.6 lakh. Second, **the rate matters too**: the ₹50,000-income row uses a 9% rate, and a higher rate shrinks the loan a given EMI can support, because more of each EMI goes to interest rather than principal. See [how interest rate affects your EMI](/learn/how-interest-rate-affects-emi/) for why even a small rate gap moves the needle. ## A worked example, start to finish Meet Priya. Net in-hand: **₹1,00,000/month.** She has no car loan, no personal loan, no card EMIs. She's eyeing a 20-year home loan at **8.5%**. 1. **FOIR budget:** 50% of ₹1,00,000 = **₹50,000** total EMI room. 2. **Existing EMIs:** none, so the full ₹50,000 is available for the home loan. 3. **Affordable EMI → loan:** at 8.5% over 240 months, ₹50,000/month supports about **₹57,61,542**. So Priya's home loan eligibility is roughly **₹57.6 lakh**. But that is *not* the price of the flat she can buy. ### Don't forget the down payment — it sits on top Lenders in India typically finance a portion of the property value and expect you to fund the rest as a **down payment** from your own savings. That down payment is **on top of** the loan, not inside it. So if Priya's loan eligibility is ₹57.6 lakh and she has, say, ₹12 lakh saved for a down payment, her realistic property budget is the loan *plus* the down payment — not the loan alone. The bigger your down payment, the larger the home you can target without needing a bigger loan (or a longer, costlier tenure). It also means you borrow less, so your total interest is lower from day one. ## Levers you control before you apply - **Clear small, high-EMI loans first.** Every existing EMI you retire frees up FOIR room and can lift your eligible amount. - **Bring a bigger down payment.** It expands your property budget without inflating the loan. - **Be cautious with tenure.** A 30-year loan boosts eligibility on paper, but you'll pay interest for a decade longer. If you stretch the tenure to qualify, plan to [prepay aggressively](/blog/how-to-pay-off-your-home-loan-faster/) later. - **Mind the rate.** A lower rate stretches the same EMI into a bigger loan. Shopping the rate — and your credit profile — is worth real money. ## The takeaway Your home loan eligibility isn't a black box. It's mostly one calculation: **net income → FOIR cap → affordable EMI (after existing EMIs) → loan amount.** A ₹1,00,000 earner with no other EMIs lands near ₹57.6 lakh at 8.5% over 20 years; stretch to 30 years and it's about ₹65 lakh, but the interest bill grows with it. Before you fall for a flat, run your own numbers in the [home loan calculator](/calculators/home-loan/) and the general [EMI calculator](/calculators/emi/), then add your down payment on top to get a property budget you can actually defend. All figures here are illustrative estimates — your real eligibility depends on your lender's FOIR policy, your credit profile, and the rate you're offered, so confirm the specifics with your lender.