What can I do to customise my loan?

If you’ve had your home loan for a while, or are a new borrower struggling to understand the often complex jargon associated with mortgages, it can be easy to set and forget your repayments.

However, taking some time to review your loan every so often, and customise it where possible, can make it easier to handle the debt and potentially save you money.

loans.com.au Managing Director Marie Mortimer believes it’s important for customers to take the opportunity to customise their home loan to suit their own lifestyle.

“For the last 10 years since we launched our business, we've been slowly developing our product base to suit the diverse range of customer needs. We know that not all customers are the same, so we have a variety of products, allowing our customers to personalise their loans based on their needs,” Ms. Mortimer said.

Check out some of our top picks on how to customise your mortgage.

Offset sub-account

An offset sub-account is a transaction account linked to your home loan. It acts just like a normal transaction account does, in that you can withdraw and deposit money, but has one key difference. The balance of your offset sub-account is offset against your home loan balance, bringing down the amount you’re charged on interest. This has the potential to save you thousands over the life of your loan.

For example, if you had a loan balance of $500,000 and $50,000 in your offset sub-account, you’d only be charged interest on $450,000 of the loan.

We offer offset sub-accounts on the majority of our home loans for just an extra 10 basis points on our already extremely competitive interest rates.

Split loan

A split loan is a great way to customise your home loan if you’re looking to take advantage of the best of both variable and fixed-rate loans. A split loan allows you to split your home loan balance so one portion is charged at a fixed rate and the other is charged at a variable rate. You can choose to split your balance however you wish, pending your lender’s approval, be it 50/50, 60/40, or 90/10.

For example, if you had a $500,000 loan, you could choose to split 60% variable and 40% fixed. This would mean you were charged a variable rate on $300,000 of the loan and a fixed rate on $200,000 of the loan.

There are a number of other benefits of split loans too. Borrowers can choose to split their loan so they can have the advantage of fixed monthly repayments through a fixed rate, and cash-flow certainty, and access to an offset sub-account and a decreased interest rate if rates drop, through a variable rate.

We offer the option to split your home loan, just talk to one of our friendly lending specialists on 13 10 90.

Fixed-loan

If you have a variable rate loan, refinancing to a fixed rate loan can be an easy way to save money. With interest rates at rock-bottom levels, fixed rates can often be a cheaper alternative to variable rates. Additionally, interest rates are likely to be as low as they’ll ever be, with the Reserve Bank’s cash rate at its lowest possible point, according to their correspondence.

Refinancing to a fixed rate means you’re locking in your home loan interest rate for a period of time, typically one to five years. This can provide assurance your repayments won’t go up and down which can help you budget effectively. Furthermore, interest rates may rise in the coming years, which you wouldn’t be affected by, as your rate has been locked in. If you’re looking for security and certainty, fixed rates can be a great way to customise your home loan.

ZIP home loan

Our ZIP Home Loan for owner-occupiers comes with a $5,000 interest free Visa debit card. You can use this card with no fear of debts, as it has 0% interest, and no monthly or ongoing fees. The loan also has a highly competitive interest rate.

Check out how much you could save and if you qualify for our ZIP Home Loan.

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