Every loan applies its regular payments through a waterfall — the order its buckets (escrow, interest, principal, late charges) get paid. That order is per loan.
Where you see it
- The Record Payment modal shows the hint "This loan applies: …" with the loan's live order, so you know how the money will flow before you save.
- The order is set in the loan wizard when creating a loan, and changed later from Edit Loan.
The default
New loans default to escrow → interest → principal → late charges. Legacy loans created before configurable waterfalls are serviced fees-first.
Reordering re-applies history
Changing the order isn't cosmetic. When you save a new order, NoteHarbor re-applies every recorded payment on the loan through the new waterfall — a full recalculation — and re-derives the late fees that follow from it. The editor warns you first: changing the order re-applies all recorded payments on the loan.
That keeps the loan's entire history consistent with one set of rules, instead of a mix of old-order and new-order payments.
Reordering is an audited change. If you only need one unusual payment (say, principal-only), use an application type on that payment instead — see Recording a payment.