Michelle Isemonger

speaker

262 appearances 1 recordings 1 series first heard Jul 2026 last heard 19 Jul

Michelle Isemonger’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 1 in all, peaking in Jul 2026 with 1.

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The Prosperity Project · What banks really check before approving your mortgage · 19 Jul 2026 podcast

So that's where sort of that regulation comes in.

But yeah, it is relatively easy.

And I mean, most of our clients at the moment are first-time buyers who are buying with less than a 20% deposit.

And, I mean, with Auckland house prices, some of them are even still getting gifting sometimes and are still low equity.

Yeah, sometimes as well.

And that's just to sort of boost them because when you're looking at the first home loan, of course, there's rules and restrictions around that in terms of income caps.

There used to be a property price cap as well, which isn't the case anymore.

But if you've got someone who's got a 5% deposit, but their incomes, if they're a couple buying together, is over $150,000, they can't get that product.

So they're going, well, what do we do?

Do we need to save more?

Do we need to wait?

Is the property market going to run away on us?

So then it's a matter of some banks do have a 5% product, but then they're adding in a low equity margin of up to 1.5%.

Yeah, that's correct.

It's a good question.

Yeah, so it's until you've dropped down the threshold.

So very much generalising here, when you've got a 10% deposit, your low equity margin could be 0.75% on top of the carded interest rates.

The banks have special interest rates, which is usually what you have access to when you've got a 20% deposit.

Yes, exactly.

But, I mean, the banks at the same time with those interest rates, the banks are testing you that you can afford that as well, which is why, to be honest with you, when you do have less than a 20% deposit, it is a bit harder or you need to buy for a little bit less as well.

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