Govt plans to relax home loan rules for younger borrowers

Treasurer Jim Chalmers has instructed financial regulators to make it easier for Australians with student debt to take out a mortgage.

Currently, the banking regulator, APRA, and the financial services regulator, ASIC, expect lenders to take HELP-HECS debt into account when assessing home loan applications. However, Dr Chalmers said he wanted lenders to be able to exclude student debt repayments from serviceability assessments when they expected the borrower to pay off the debt in “the near term”, the Australian Financial Review reported.

“I’ve agreed these changes in discussions with regulators and convened the banks to discuss them,” Dr Chalmers said. “People with a HELP debt should be treated fairly when they want to buy a house and we’re working with the regulators to make sure they are.”

While Dr Chalmers has not indicated when these changes would take effect, if you contact me, I can calculate how much you can borrow now and estimate how much you might be able to borrow under the new rules.