The government’s oldest housing program has a new twist: Borrowers now can add the cost of replacing worn-out appliances, leaky windows or squeaky floors to their mortgages without a lot of fuss or muss, at least financially.

Under a sleeker, quicker version of the Federal Housing Administration’s 203(k) renovation-loan program, buyers of otherwise solid houses can roll the cost of these and other repairs into a government-insured mortgage, eliminating the need for a more expensive second mortgage or of digging deeper into pocketbooks.

While the loan program is designed primarily to move fixer-uppers into the hands of new and credit-worthy owners, it also can be used to refinance an existing loan to pay for fixing up a place, as long as the borrower does not extract any equity from the property.