Term of Loan

The term of a loan is the total number of payment periods until the loan is fully repaid.

Along with the Interest Rate, Principal, payment amount and payment period, it is one of the five items of a loan calculation — given any four, the missing one can be solved.
When the term is not an integer, the regular payments cannot repay the loan exactly, and the Final Payment differs from them. If the remainder is paid together with the last regular payment, that final payment is larger than the others — a Balloon Payment. If it is paid one period after the last regular payment, it is a separate payment smaller than the others — a Drop Payment.

Solving for Term A $5{,}000$ loan at $8\%$ annual interest is repaid with annual payments of $900$ . Find the term.
Answer $5000 = 900\,a_{\overline{n}|8\%}$ , so $a_{\overline{n}|} = 5.555556$ :
 $\begin{align*} n &= \frac{-\ln(1 - 0.08 \times 5.555556)}{\ln 1.08} \\ &= \frac{0.587787}{0.076961} \\ &= 7.64 \text{ years} \end{align*}$ 
8 payments needed, with a smaller final payment: 7 full payments of $900$ leave a balance of $5000(1.08)^7 - 900\,s_{\overline{7}|8\%} = 538.60$ , repaid by a drop payment of $538.60(1.08) = 581.69$ at the end of year 8.