No cost impact if you reduce sanctioned loan amount

Axis bank has sanctioned me a home loan of Rs25 lakh. The bank has already disbursed Rs15 lakh to the builder. Now I don’t require any more disbursement from the bank. In this case can the bank charge me for not availing the total amount sanctioned?
—Pramod Shinde
You can approach the bank to  get the sanctioned loan amount reduced. Please note that the bank may not refund you any portion of the processing fees paid in case you want the loan sanctioned to be reduced. But there is unlikely to be any other cost or impact of such reduction in the sanctioned amount.

I am running short of around Rs2 lakh for my house construction. My lender is not ready to top up loan. What is the best option to get money under this circumstance? I don’t want to contact my friends or relatives.
    — Raj Kumar
The eligibility for a top-up loan is based on your income and repayment. You can try and raise loan against security such as shares, life insurance policies with high surrender values, units of mutual funds, fixed deposits, jewellery etc. As a last resort you can apply for a personal loan. You can also take loan against your provident fund account in case you are a salaried employee and have completed at least 5 years in the employee provident fund scheme.

I would like to know the maximum renewal age for oriental insurance. Also, I have heard that after 70, companies hesitate to renew the policy. In such a scenario is it advisable to keep two policies and go for health policies which can be renewed for lifetime. Please advice on Apollo DKV and oriental insurance — R S Pillai
Oriental insurance policies are renewable for lifetime. The insurance company cannot refuse to renew the policy except in the case of fraud. They can certainly ask for higher premium in later years after you make a claim which is called loading on premium amount. You can take policy from two different companies. Before you finalise the policy we would advise you to compare the policies on a few parameters like sub-limit, co-pay and coverage of pre-existing diseases. Both Apollo Munich and Oriental would offer you lifetime renewal policies but there are sub-limits on room rent in the Oriental policy according to which the insured can get 1% of sum assured to a maximum of ¤5,000 per day in case of hospitalisation. Apollo policy doesn’t have any such limits. Both the policies don’t have any co-pay.

The writer is CEO, Apna Paisa, a price & features comparison
engine for loans, insurance and investments. He can be reached at hrdna@apnapaisa.com.