Terms Used In Iowa Code 537.2401

  • Contract: A legal written agreement that becomes binding when signed.
  • Finance charge: The total cost of credit a customer must pay on a consumer loan, including interest. The Truth in Lending Act requires disclosure of the finance charge. Source: OCC
  • following: when used by way of reference to a chapter or other part of a statute mean the next preceding or next following chapter or other part. See Iowa Code 4.1
  • month: means a calendar month, and the word "year" and the abbreviation "A. See Iowa Code 4.1
  • Mortgage: The written agreement pledging property to a creditor as collateral for a loan.
  • state: when applied to the different parts of the United States, includes the District of Columbia and the territories, and the words "United States" may include the said district and territories. See Iowa Code 4.1
  • Truth in Lending Act: The Truth in Lending Act is a federal law that requires lenders to provide standardized information so that borrowers can compare loan terms. In general, lenders must provide information on Source: OCC
  • United States: includes all the states. See Iowa Code 4.1
  • year: means twelve consecutive months. See Iowa Code 4.1
537.2401 Finance charge for consumer loans not pursuant to open-end credit.
1. Except as provided with respect to a finance charge for loans pursuant to open-end
credit under § 537.2402 and loans secured by a certificate of title of a motor vehicle under § 537.2403, a lender may contract for and receive a finance charge not exceeding the maximum charge permitted by the laws of this state or of the United States for similar lenders, and, in addition, with respect to a consumer loan, a supervised financial organization or a mortgage lender may contract for and receive a finance charge, calculated according to the actuarial method, not exceeding twenty-one percent per year on the unpaid balance of the amount financed. Except as provided in § 537.2403, this subsection does not prohibit a lender from contracting for and receiving a finance charge exceeding twenty-one percent per year on the unpaid balance of the amount financed on consumer loans if authorized by other provisions of the law.
2. This section does not limit or restrict the manner of calculating the finance charge, whether by way of add-on, discount, or otherwise, so long as the rate of the finance charge does not exceed that permitted by this section or the laws of this state or of the United States. The finance charge permitted by this section or the laws of this state or of the United States may be calculated by determining the single annual percentage rate as required to be disclosed to the consumer pursuant to § 537.3201 which, when applied according to the actuarial method to the unpaid balances of the amount financed, will yield the finance charge for that transaction which would result from applying any graduated rates permitted by this section or the laws of this state or of the United States to the transaction on the assumption that all scheduled payments will be made when due. If the loan is a precomputed consumer credit transaction, the finance charge may be calculated on the assumption that all scheduled payments will be made when due, and the effect of prepayment is governed by § 537.2510.
3. Except as provided in subsection 5, the term of a loan for the purposes of this section commences on the date the loan is made. Any month may be counted as one-twelfth of a year but a day is counted as one-three hundred sixty-fifth of a year. Subject to classifications and differentiations the lender may reasonably establish, a part of a month in excess of fifteen days may be treated as a full month if periods of fifteen days or less are disregarded and that procedure is not consistently used to obtain a greater yield than would otherwise be permitted. The administrator may adopt rules not inconsistent with the Truth in Lending Act with respect to treating as regular other minor irregularities in amount or time.
4. Subject to classifications and differentiations the lender may reasonably establish, the lender may make the same finance charge on all amounts financed within a specified range. A finance charge so made does not violate subsection 1, if both of the following are applicable: a. When applied to the median amount within each range, it does not exceed the
maximum permitted by that subsection.
b. When applied to the lowest amount within each range, it does not produce a rate of finance charge exceeding the rate calculated according to paragraph “”a”” by more than eight percent of the rate calculated according to paragraph “”a””.
5. With respect to an insurance premium loan, the term of the loan commences on the earliest inception date of a policy or contract of insurance for which the premium is financed.
[C75, 77, 79, 81, §537.2401; 82 Acts, ch 1153, §16, 18(1)]
83 Acts, ch 124, §26; 2007 Acts, ch 26, §1
Referred to in §533.316, 537.1301, 537.2308, 537.2504, 537.2505