How Much Is a Mortgage on a $700,000 House in Northern Virginia?

How much is a mortgage on a $700k house? Two things drive the real cost of a $700,000 house in Northern Virginia, and neither of them is the thing buyers spend their time on. The first is which county you buy in, which moves your payment by more than $200 a month. The second is how you handle mortgage insurance if you are not putting 20% down. Rate shopping matters, but it matters less than either of those, and this guide spends its time accordingly.

First, kill the jumbo myth

A large number of buyers at this price arrive convinced they need a jumbo loan, usually because a national lender or a national article told them so. In Northern Virginia that is wrong by a wide margin, and it is one of the first things we correct as mortgage lenders in Virginia.

The 2026 conforming loan limit across the Washington metro area, which covers Fairfax, Loudoun, Arlington, Prince William, Stafford and the City of Alexandria, is $1,249,125 for a single-family home. The national baseline is $832,750. A $700,000 purchase with any normal down payment produces a loan well under both figures, so it is a plain conforming loan. Not jumbo. Not even high balance.

Federal Housing Finance Agency 2026 conforming loan limit values, county file, CBSA 47900 Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, effective January 1, 2026.

A 700k mortgage payment is not one number. It moves with the rate you lock, the down payment you bring, and the county you buy in, and in Northern Virginia the county is worth more than most buyers expect. The tables below hold the loan amount steady and change one variable at a time so you can see which lever actually moves your monthly figure.

Your 700k mortgage payment, by rate and down payment

Rates move every week, so here is the payment across a realistic band rather than one number that ages badly, and our payment calculator rebuilds them at today’s rate. All figures are 30-year fixed.

Calculated on a 30-year fixed amortization. Rate reference: Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey, week ending August 27, 2026, 30-year fixed averaged 6.66%, 15-year averaged 5.98%. Principal and interest only; taxes, insurance and any mortgage insurance are additional.

The county spread: the same house, five different payments

This is the number nobody quotes you, and the reason our Virginia mortgage page compares counties side by side. Northern Virginia jurisdictions set their own real estate tax rates, and on a $700,000 assessment the gap between the cheapest and the most expensive is $2,439 a year. That is $203 a month, every month, for as long as you own the house, and it is decided entirely by which side of a line the property sits on.

Fairfax County Tax Administration, tax year 2026: base $1.12 plus $0.0325 stormwater and $0.001 infestation prevention. Loudoun County Property Tax Rates 2026: general county levy $0.805, before any Dulles Rail or Route 28 district levy. Prince William County Tax Rates 2026: $0.865 base, $0.0700 fire and rescue, $0.0020 mosquito and forest pest. Arlington County FY2027 adopted revenue summary: CY2026 rate $1.053, with the former sanitary district stormwater rate replaced by a utility fee. City of Alexandria FY2026 adopted rate $1.135. Figures assume the assessment equals a $700,000 purchase price.

Two practical notes. First, your assessment is not automatically your purchase price, though in a reasonably active market they track closely, and a purchase often triggers a reassessment toward what you paid. Second, Loudoun’s headline rate is the general county levy; if the house sits inside a Metro or Route 28 service district the applicable levy is higher, so check the specific parcel rather than assuming the county average.

Over ten years, choosing Loudoun over Fairfax on an equivalent $700,000 house is roughly $24,000 in tax, before any rate changes. That is not an argument for either county. It is an argument for putting the real number in your spreadsheet before you decide, rather than after.

The 20% question, answered with actual numbers

At $700,000, twenty percent is $140,000. That is a lot of cash to move out of your life, and the honest answer is that it is not always the right call. Here is what the alternative costs.

Private mortgage insurance on a conventional loan is priced on your credit score and your loan-to-value, so it is a range rather than a single figure. At the strong end of the credit spectrum you might see something near 0.5% of the loan a year; weaker credit at high loan-to-value can approach 1.0% or more. Both bookends are shown so you can see the width of the outcome.

PMI figures are illustrative bookends calculated as an annual percentage of the loan amount divided by twelve, not quotes. Actual PMI pricing depends on credit score, loan-to-value, loan term and coverage level, and is quoted by the mortgage insurer at application.

Put the two together. Going from 20% down to 10% down frees up $70,000 of cash. It costs you about $450 a month in extra principal and interest, which is simply the cost of borrowing more, plus PMI of roughly $262 to $525 depending on your credit. Call it $712 to $975 a month all in, and only the PMI half of that is money that buys you nothing.

The part that changes the calculation: conventional PMI is cancellable. Once you reach 20% equity you can request removal, and at 22% it comes off automatically. FHA mortgage insurance on a loan originated above 95% loan-to-value does not work that way and stays for the life of the loan. If you are choosing between the two at this price, that difference usually decides it. Our guide on removing PMI walks through the mechanics.

What you need to earn

Using the 28% housing guideline, the one behind our affordability calculator, and building the payment from principal, interest and county tax:

Payment is principal and interest of $3,599 at 6.66% plus that jurisdiction’s monthly tax from the table above plus an assumed $150 a month for homeowners insurance, which is a placeholder for the arithmetic rather than a market average; get a real quote. Income is the payment divided by 0.28, annualised, rounded. This is a screening guideline, not an underwriting decision.

Underwriters will approve above these figures, often well above, depending on your other debts, your reserves and your credit. The guideline is a sanity check, not a ceiling. If you want the reverse calculation, from salary to price, see what a $200,000 salary buys in Northern Virginia.

If you already own, which most buyers at this price do

The $700,000 buyer in Northern Virginia is usually not a first-time buyer. They own something already, and the real problem is sequencing: the down payment is sitting in the current house, and selling first means moving twice. Our sister team, The Jamil Brothers, handles the sale of the current home so the two closings line up.

There are three workable structures. You can buy with 10% down using cash on hand and recast the loan after your sale closes, which drops the payment without refinancing. You can use a home equity line on the current property for the down payment, then retire it from the sale proceeds. Or you can make the purchase contingent on your sale, which costs you negotiating position in a competitive submarket but costs you nothing in interest.

function open() { [native code] }Which one is right depends on how much equity you have and how tight the market is where you are buying. We cover the mechanics in using home equity to buy before you sell.

Questions people actually ask

Is a $700,000 loan a jumbo loan in Northern Virginia?

No. The 2026 conforming limit across the Washington metro area is $1,249,125 and the national baseline is $832,750. A $700,000 purchase is a conforming loan by a wide margin, which means better pricing and standard underwriting.

How much cash do I need in total?

The down payment plus closing costs. On a $700,000 purchase, budget 2% to 3% of the price for closing, roughly $14,000 to $21,000, covering lender fees, title insurance, the appraisal, Virginia state recordation tax of $0.25 per $100 on both the deed and the deed of trust, the local recordation tax most jurisdictions add on top at one third of the state amount, and prepaid escrows. At 20% down that is about $154,000 to $161,000 all in. Recordation rates per Virginia Code § 58.1-801, § 58.1-803 and § 58.1-814.

Which Northern Virginia county has the lowest property tax?

Of the jurisdictions in the table above, Loudoun County's general levy of $0.805 per $100 is the lowest and Fairfax County's $1.1535 is the highest, a difference of $2,439 a year on a $700,000 assessment. Check the specific parcel, because district levies can change the answer.

Should I put 20% down or keep the cash?

It depends on what the cash would otherwise do and on your PMI quote, which is priced on your credit. The useful frame is that conventional PMI is cancellable at 20% equity, so putting 10% down is a temporary cost rather than a permanent one. Get both scenarios priced before deciding.

Does a VA loan work at $700,000?

Yes. With full entitlement there is no VA loan limit, so a $700,000 purchase with nothing down is possible for an eligible borrower, with no monthly mortgage insurance. The funding fee is 2.15% for a first use with nothing down, and it is waived for borrowers receiving or eligible for VA compensation for a service-connected disability.

How much is the 700k mortgage payment per month?

On a 700k mortgage payment at a 30 year fixed rate, principal and interest alone runs in the low to mid four thousands across the rate band in the table above. Add Northern Virginia property tax and homeowners insurance and the real monthly number lands meaningfully higher, and mortgage insurance is on top of that at anything under 20 percent down on a conventional loan. Run your own county and rate before you set a budget, because the spread between Arlington and Prince William on the same price is not small.