ANALYSIS

Banks will have breathed a sigh of relief last week, after the ABS’s September quarter inflation numbers came in hot.

No need to worry about a rate cut at the November RBA meeting. Or December for that matter. In fact, lenders may not have to worry about discounts to their customers’ home loan payments for six months or more.

Maybe not even again if this rate cutting cycle has come to an earlier than anticipated end.

Banks may be off the hook and can now get back to doing what they do best: Making lots of money for their shareholders.

MORE: RBA worst fears realised as home prices soar

That is, unless we keep them on their toes by finding those discounts ourselves.

There are currently a number of mortgage deals on the market that can save you significant money, if you are prepared to fix your interest rate.

Ordinarily, banks love you to lock in fixed rates when the RBA is in a cutting cycle, because they think they can tempt you into locking in a rate that will end up being higher than where variable rates fall to during your fixed term.

Right now, however, with inflation uncertainty, employment uncertainty and a fair bit of various other types of global uncertainty, borrowers can benefit with some certainty in their lives. A home loan saving locked in now via a fixed rate is unlikely to be undone by any major downward movements in variable rates over the next year.

In fact, it could also act as a hedge against an outcome that some pundits believe is getting more real by the day … that the RBA’s next move may even be a hike.

Canstar crunched the numbers and found there were significant savings to be made by fixing your home loan rate for one or two years, even if the RBA were to cut the cash rate again in the short term.

MORE:Nine in 10 homeowners face mortgage nightmare

For one year fixed rate products, SWS Bank has the best offering of 4.69 per cent.

This is well below the lowest variable rate for an average borrower (with a $600,000 loan and 25 years remaining on the loan term), which is 5.08 per cent.

Fixing with SWS Bank for one year would save that borrower $2334 if the RBA did not cut for the next year. If the RBA cut once by 0.25 per cent, the switch would still see the borrower save $1342. Two rate cuts and the borrower would still save $725.

For two year fixed rate products, Australian Mutual Bank and Pacific Mortgage Group lead the market with 4.74 per cent.

Over two years, the borrower could save $4055 if there were no RBA cuts and $1585 if there was one cut. In this scenario however, two rate cuts would see the fixed rate borrower worse off by $504.

Canstar data insights director Sally Tindall said only a small fraction of the borrower market locked in fixed rates, despite the savings on offer.

“The peak of fixing was July 2021, when rates were at a historic low,” Ms Tindall said. “At that point 46 per cent of new and refinanced loans opted for a fixed rate according to the ABS.”

MORE:Warning over horror rate scenario ahead

Back then, the cash rate had been lowered to 0.1 per cent and there were fixed rates on offer of 2 per cent and below, with four year terms available.

Fast forward to April, 2024 and just 1.2 per cent of borrowers opted for fixed. The take up this year is similarly low.

“CBA’s full year results show that in the six months to June 2025, 1 per cent of new loans opted for a fixed rate, in dollar terms,” Ms Tindall said. “Westpac’s full year results for the six months to September 2025 show the same – that is – 1 per cent of new loans opted for fixed.”

Ms Tindall said it was important to realised that nothing is guaranteed when it comes to RBA cash rate movements.

“Things can change and decisions can be made quickly,” she said. “There is absolutely no guarantee that you will save $4000 by fixing for two years.”

She said that mortgage offsets were also rare with fixed rate products, meaning savings on repayments could be completely swallowed up by the lack of flexible features in the loan, but that there were exceptions.

“Offset accounts aren’t usually offered on a fixed rate loan, however (some) banks offer them. This includes Adelaide Bank, MOVE Bank, Qantas Money, ANZ (on its one-year fixed loan only) and BankWest (partial offset).”

Finder head of consumer research Graham Cooke said anyone considering fixing should weigh up some key questions.

“Even though the chance of a cut this year has increasingly disappeared, two thirds of experts on our panel are still predicting at least one cut in the next 12 months,” Mr Cooke said.

“So, fixing will depend on whether you think this is true or, as some more controversial commentators have suggested, we could actually see spiralling inflation and a rate rise.

“I wouldn’t be locking in a fixed rate just yet, but the next few months of economic data will be crucial.”

Best one year fixed rates:

SWS Bank- 4.69 per cent

Pacific Mortgage Group- 4.84 per cent

Horizon Bank- 4.94 per cent

Up- 4.95 per cent

Best two year fixed rates:

Australian Mutual Bank, Pacific Mortgage Group- 4.74 per cent

Queensland Country Bank, Greater Bank, Southern Cross Credit Union- 4.79 per cent

Police Bank, Horizon Bank- 4.84 per cent

The post Best fixed rates on market and their savings revealed appeared first on realestate.com.au.

Australia’s housing market has become gripped in a first-home buying frenzy following the federal government’s controversial decision to supercharge its First Home Guarantee scheme last month.

The scheme allows buyers to enter the market with just a 5 per cent deposit and have government “guarantee” the rest of a traditional 20 per cent deposit, helping buyers get into the market faster.

New figures have revealed a 39.2 per cent surge in applications for the scheme since it was expanded in October, pushing first-home buyer spending to levels not seen in years.

The data, from Australia’s largest mortgage aggregator Loan Market Group, revealed the increase in first-home buyers occurred in every major state.

MORE: Bank’s brutal reaction to couple’s loan plea

Queensland was the epicentre of the surge, recording a 55.2 per cent jump in average weekly applications over October. This was followed by South Australia, where applications rose by just under 45 per cent.

There was also a rise in NSW and Victoria, both states where first-home buyer activity has been low for years. Both states saw an increase of about 34 per cent.

Loan Market broker Max White said the surge began the moment the government announced in August that it would be fast-tracking its amendments in October.

These amendments included rising the price caps for eligibility (including in Sydney where $1.5m became the cut off for first-home buyers to access the support). Salary caps were removed.

MORE: $120k rise: how much the average Sydney house is now worth

The scheme allows buyers to enter the market with just a 5 per cent deposit – and some applicants are even eligible for buying with deposits as low as 2 per cent.

Government then acts as guarantor for 15 or 18 per cent of the loan — removing the need for costly lenders mortgage insurance and helping buyers leapfrog years of saving.

“As soon as news came out that the changes to the scheme would be introduced in October rather than next year, first-home buyers reached out to get pre-approved with lenders who participate in the scheme,” Mr White said.

He added that the scheme was helping more buyers land a foot on the property ladder.

“The take-up shows how much first-home buyers were needing more support to break into competitive property markets,” Mr White said.

Renewed first-home buyer spending was partly behind home prices hitting a record peak over October, according to REA Group economist Eleanor Creagh.

Ms Creagh said higher first-home buyer spending coincided with a rise in demand from every other buyer segment – all at a time when listing levels and the construction pipeline remained constrained.

Australian home prices are now up nearly $65,000 from a year ago, PropTrack figures showed.

Agents are also reporting a return of buyer FOMO – not just from those accessing the scheme but other buyers fearful it will drive up prices.

“Everyone is terrified of how much the scheme will increase prices around them and they want to get in before it happens,” said Angus Gorrie, a top Sydney agent at Ray White Eastern Beaches.

Some property experts fear the policy has major drawbacks.

Property expert Darragh Heard of Tallpopie said there were similarities between the scheme and lending practices that led to one of the worst overseas financial disasters.

“Buyers beware,” she said. “There’s an air of the 2007 US market crash about this scheme.

“Access now may mean entrapment long-term. Higher mortgage repayments, greater interest, and what if property value falls. This needs to be regulated to the hilt.”

AMP chief economist Shane Oliver was vocal about his opposition to the scheme while appearing on Mark Bouris’ ‘Property Insights’ podcast.

Mr Oliver repeatedly called the scheme “ridiculous”. He argued it was not in the best interest of most first-home buyers.

“If you get in first … then fantastic, you get an advantage,” he said. “But (for) everybody else down the queue, the price just goes up by the same amount (as the price cap increase). It’s ridiculous.”

Mr Oliver said young people using the scheme would have to incur substantially more debt – even if they saved on lender’s mortgage insurance.

He noted that those using the scheme would be lumped with pricier loans and they would borrow 95 per cent of the value of their property purchases.

MORE: Major update: Wilkinson, FitzSimons’ big loss

Simon Ma, the head of advisory group Our Top 10, said the scheme would encourage buyers to borrow more, extending the life of their debt.

“Some first-home buyers believe the government is contributing the additional 15 per cent deposit, leaving them with an 80 per cent LVR loan. That’s not how it works,” Mr Ma said.

“Buyers are taking on a 95 per cent LVR loan, borrowing 95 per cent of the property value. The government guarantee simply removes the need for lenders mortgage insurance, it doesn’t reduce the loan size.”

The post First-home scheme triggers huge shift in Australian housing market appeared first on realestate.com.au.

Two bidders have splashed more than $200,000 above the reserve price for a Belmont home despite a massive structural fault that risks turning it into a money pit.

The three-bedroom house at 16 Fisher Ave, Belmont, was listed with $400,000 to $440,000 price expectations as Hayeswinckle Geelong agent Kin Sawhney declaring a crack in the concrete slab would need to be rectified.

Mr Sawhney said estimates for calling in tradies to fix the crack itself would cost between $30,000 and $40,000.

But he said it was the untold damage that would come after repairing the foundation that became the key factor to list the property for its land value alone.

“We had crazy competition there. The reserve was at $430,000 and the owners were more than happy to get that amount. But then it went absolutely bonkers with the competition,” Mr Sawhney said.

The $635,000 sale price was around the price estimate Mr Sawhney said he would have listed the property for had not had any structural defects.

It was a long battle between two buyers that lasted 45 minutes, he said.

“They’re saying that they’re going to keep the property, probably do some work and keep it as a rental for four, five or six years and then maybe demolish it and put down some units there.

“They basically bought it as a medium to long-term plan, rather than a short flip.”

Mr Sawhney said the result was another sign of the focus property investors were having on Geelong as the region emerges from a two-year downturn in the market.

“I think anything up to $650,000 on the market is getting a lot of traction with investors,” he said.

“Obviously this was not supposed to go for this price, but anything below $500,000 the investors just come in and buy pretty much anything right now.”

Mr Sawhney said he was upfront in declaring the issues with the home for new owners.

“The owners had quotes to fix it up for anywhere between $30,000 to $40,000,” he said.

“We were explaining to buyers that this is just the cost to fix the concrete.

“Obviously when that is fixed, it’s going to lead to problems with your windows, your floors, your carpet and all these other things to spend money to fix as well.

“And we can’t estimate how much that is, because we don’t know what extent is going to happen”

Belmont has a median house price of $689,500, according to PropTrack data.

The post Belmont home’s $200k premium, despite $40k broken slab appeared first on realestate.com.au.

Australian homeowners are staring down a bleak Christmas as the RBA looks poised to keep the cash rate on hold at its upcoming board meeting today, but one expert has flagged the possibility of a shock rate hike.

The consensus from economists and banks is that high inflation will scupper any chance of another interest rate cut and many are now predicting a new cut, if it comes at all, will occur over February.

But property economist Andrew Wilson said the argument for the RBA to “take back” one of this year’s 0.25 per cent interest rate cuts could grow stronger if electricity prices continued to soar.

Trimmed mean inflation, which the RBA views as the most accurate measure, was 3.2 per cent over the year to September, above the RBA target band of 2-3 per cent.

AMP chief economist Shane Oliver said the inflation uptick meant a Melbourne Cup Day rate cut was improbable, but a weakening jobs market also kept the door open for a cut in a few months’ time.

MORE: Worst RBA fears realised after Aus home prices go ballistic

“The high reading for trimmed mean inflation will keep the RBA on hold in November, but (we) still expect high unemployment and slower inflation to drive a cut next year,” he said.

Geoffrey Kingston, professor at the Macquarie University Business School’s department of economics, said another cut was still on the cards but the end of the rate cutting cycle was now in view.

“(The RBA’s) initial response to emerging stagflation will probably be to keep rates on hold,” he said. “Around the middle of next year there will be a cut in response to high unemployment.

“Around the end of next year, however, we may see the beginning of another tightening cycle.”

MORE: Bank’s brutal reaction to couple’s loan plea

A Finder.com.au survey of 35 economists and property experts revealed all but five expected the RBA to hold rates at its Melbourne Cup Day board meeting.

A third of the economists polled predicted a cut in February, while two thirds predicted a cut at some point between February and May.

Some families may struggle to wait till next year. A recent survey of household spending revealed mortgage stress levels have been steadily rising in some states despite previous interest rate cuts this year.

Part of the reason is that other living costs have surged and the relief offered by this year’s three rounds of rate cuts was insufficient to make up for higher electricity, groceries and insurance costs.

The surveys from research group Digital Finance Analytics showed the biggest spikes in NSW and WA. Some 51.2 per cent of NSW property owners were in “mortgage stress” – spending an unsustainable amount of their income on repayments.

This was up from the 49.1 per cent reported to be in mortgage stress at the start of the year – before this year’s three cuts. The numbers were close to identical in WA.

Credit reporting agency Illion also revealed that families were increasingly turning to credit cards and other forms of personal loans to make up for shortfalls in their incomes.

Digital Finance Analytics data scientist Martin North observed a growing split in the fortunes of homeowners, with most struggling, but others “with plenty of cash flow”.

“We see a split between the two cohorts,” he said, noting interest rate cuts had also fuelled steep rises in the amount of equity held by some homeowners.

PropTrack data showed the average value of detached Sydney houses ballooned by $120,000 over the past year, with the average value of houses in some eastern suburbs growing by double that.

Sydney homeowner Mark Lawrenson recently refinanced his home loan to save money and said a rate cut would have helped.

“We are reasonably cautious with our finances so we are always careful not to overextend ourselves,” he said.

“We of course would prefer for rates to come down … It’s always an expensive period coming up.”

Their mortgage broker Richard Brown of Mortgage Choice-Epping said banks were offering good deals for refinancers and many homeowners could get relief by negotiating a new rate with banks before an RBA move.

– With reporting by Kaylee Cranley

The post RBA interest rates timeline: What economists are forecasting appeared first on realestate.com.au.

NEXA Lending is continuing its legal battle against former employee Kristine Wake and has expanded its lawsuit, alleging that Wake and others misappropriated trade secrets, violated contracts and attempted to recruit NEXA employees to a competitor.

The original suit, filed in May 2025 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona, only named Wake, a former senior employee who led NEXA’s Mortgage Academy training program and handled human resources.

As of Oct. 31, the Chandler, Arizona-based lender added Matthew Grella, his wife, Sheridan Murray-Grella, and Platinum One Lending as defendants to the suit.

‘Civil conspiracy’

NEXA claims the group used confidential information from its internal Mortgage Academy training program to benefit Platinum One Lending, a Michigan-based competitor in which Grella holds an ownership interest.

NEXA also accuses Grella and Platinum One of encouraging Wake’s breaches and working with her to recruit NEXA’s staff to harm the company. The company calls this a civil conspiracy.

The amendment builds upon the May 2025 filing, which alleges that NEXA learned in September 2024 that Wake was involved in an effort to create or manage a competing company called NEXXT Level Mortgage. It claims she solicited approximately 12 NEXA employees for the business while still being employed at NEXA. The filing said Wake asked these employees to sign nondisclosure agreements.

NEXA also alleges that Wake maintained an internet domain name associated with NEXA’s training program, WhyNexaAcademy.com, which she has refused to release to NEXA unless she is paid a fee of $18,000.

The suit also alleges that Wake, who had access to NEXA’s confidential business and training materials — including marketing plans and internal procedures — took the materials when she left and used them for herself and her new employer, Platinum One Lending.

May’s suit asserts that Wake violated the Anti-Cybersquatting Consumer Protection Act, breached her contract and loyalty of duty, displayed acts of unfair competition and misappropriated trade secrets.

NEXA is seeking damages exceeding $75,000, punitive awards and a court order requiring Wake to transfer the WhyNexaAcademy.com domain. The defendants have not yet filed responses to the amended complaint.

Attorneys for both the defendants and plaintiff, as well as Platinum One Lending, did not immediately respond to HousingWire‘s requests for comment.

Grella shared a statement with HousingWire that called the lawsuit “frivolous” and “damaging to NEXA’s business.”

“This is just the latest development in the ongoing saga of what I feel is serious misconduct by Mr. Kortas. As I have detailed in my own complaints against him,” the statement read. “… This lawsuit in particular demonstrates his willingness to launch a personal vendetta against anyone who disagrees with him. I am disappointed to see the company we built together get dragged down by what I believe to be his prioritizing fronting in public over focusing on his responsibilities as a CEO.

“… Regarding this litigation, we look forward to demonstrating how baseless each and every claim in Mr. Kortas’s lawsuit is in court. The employee in question left NEXA due to what she felt was a toxic, untenable work environment, and she is not even serving in the same role at Platinum One as she served at NEXA.

“Mr. Kortas’ amorphous identification of the alleged trade secrets are incredibly vague because, we believe, the trade secrets do not exist. Furthermore, this employee responded with a much more substantial complaint alleging that Nexa failed to compensate her for her managerial work at the company. If that is indeed the case, we hope that Nexa repays her for any unpaid labor detailed in the complaint.”

Not NEXA’s first legal rodeo

NEXA has named the Grella couple in past litigation. In April 2024, a separate complaint filed by NEXA accuses Grella and his wife, Sheridan Murray-Grella, of breaching contracts and fiduciary duties, interfering with business relationships, and committing fraud and defamation, among other allegations.

Grella, who was NEXA’s co-founder alongside Mike Kortas after they each left Equity Prime Mortgage in 2017, was terminated from NEXA in March 2024 during buyout negotiations. Grella had previously filed a lawsuit alleging that Kortas used company funds for aircraft-related purchases without his approval. Kortas has denied the claims.