Even if you receive a large cash gift for your deposit, most lenders still require you to show at least 5% of the purchase price in funds you saved yourself. However, you can skip it if you are an eligible medical, legal, or accounting professional. In 2026, many banks also offer LMI waivers for Nurses and Midwives with a 10% deposit, potentially saving you over $20,000 upfront. In Australia, most lenders require a deposit between 5% and 20% of the purchase price. While a 5% deposit gets you into the market sooner, a 20% deposit offers major financial perks. The features that come with the account, such as access to ATMs, online banking, or customer service options, may also influence the deposit amount.
A 20% deposit on the median capital-city home in early 2026 ran from about $165,000 in Melbourne to roughly $259,000 in Sydney (Cotality, February 2026). But first home buyers rarely buy the median or save 20%; using the 5% Deposit Scheme, the deposit you actually need is 5% of an entry-level home, often $30,000 to $50,000. These are median homes across the whole city; entry-level and outer-suburb places sit well below them, and that’s where most first home buyers actually buy. And the median isn’t the same as the 5% Deposit Scheme price cap in every state any more. In Perth, for instance, the median has pushed past the $850,000 WA cap, so a median Perth home no longer fits the 5% scheme (more on that below).
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Regional Home Guarantee
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- Every guide on NestPath is written from real experience, not a marketing department.
- Under this new shared-equity scheme, the federal government could contribute up to 30–40% of the purchase price.
- In the 2026 Australian market, your best strategy depends on your timeline, your career, and how much “skin in the game” you can afford today.
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- Banks do not just care about the amount of your deposit; they care about the source.
Lock-in a competitive interest rate from as short as 1 month to as long as 5 years. This information is general in nature and has been prepared without taking your personal objectives, circumstances and needs into account. You should consider the appropriateness of the information to your own circumstances and, if necessary, seek appropriate professional advice. If the bank is lending you anything more than 80% LVR, you’ll generally need Lenders Mortgage Insurance. There are a number of ways the government can assist with buying a home. The medians below are houses-and-units combined (dwelling values) from the Cotality Home Value Index, February 2026 release.
Understanding Lenders Mortgage Insurance (LMI)
Any tax information described is general in nature and it is not tax advice or a guide to tax laws. We recommend you seek independent, professional tax advice applicable to your personal circumstances. Find out more about the potential costs you need to consider when buying a home. For those with deposits less than 20% of the property’s value, Lenders Mortgage Insurance can help you. For example, a loan of $400,000 to buy a property worth $500,000 results in a loan to value ratio of 80%.
How Long Will It Take to Save?
If prices are climbing faster than you can save, getting in now with a 10% deposit and around $10,000 of LMI can cost less than waiting two more years while the same home rises $50,000. A mortgage broker can model both scenarios for you, and our full LMI guide walks through who pays it and how to dodge it. To keep the guarantee, you must meet obligations on an ongoing basis, such as living in the property as an owner-occupier. If these aren’t met, the guarantee may no longer apply, and your lender may require you to pay Lenders Mortgage Insurance or other additional costs. “Genuine savings” is money held in your account for at least 3 months.
Other guides to help
On a $600,000 home with a 5% deposit ($30,000), expect roughly $25,000 to $31,000. The 5% Deposit Scheme removes LMI altogether, because the government covers the gap to the lender instead. At 5%, $10,000 covers about a $200,000 purchase, which is below most capital-city prices. You need a minimum of 2% to 5% of the purchase price, depending on the path. Through a government scheme like the 5% Deposit Scheme (formerly the First Home Guarantee) you can buy with 5% and pay no LMI; through the Family Home Guarantee, just 2%.
What Is A Home Loan Deposit?
This federal scheme is a game-changer for those who have a 5% deposit but want to avoid the $30,000+ LMI fee. Saving for an $800,000 home can feel like a mountain to climb. However, with the right strategy, you can cut years off your timeline. Whether you need $40,000 (5%) or $160,000 (20%), here is how to make your money work harder in the 2026 market. Most Australian lenders have a Maximum Total LVR (usually 98% including LMI).
- Even if you receive a large cash gift for your deposit, most lenders still require you to show at least 5% of the purchase price in funds you saved yourself.
- All the sites carry full libraries of 3,500–10,000+ games, AU-available support, and cashout options that don’t require waiting on a bank transfer.
- The Regional Home Guarantee allows borrowers to avoid paying lenders mortgage insurance (LMI) because the government acts as a guarantor on part of the loan.
- Here’s every deposit path open to Australian buyers in 2026, lowest entry point first.
- As Brisbane’s top-rated brokers, we have access to over 30 lenders and intimately understand the 2026 credit policies that banks won’t tell you about.
You could become a homeowner sooner with government-backed grants and schemes when applying for your home loan. The government has a one-off payment that can be made to first-time home buyers, helping them towards their first home. The first step in getting a house deposit together to buy your new home is to know what kind of price range you should be looking at. Knowing your price range will mean you can look at a potential home without worrying if it’s within your budget. These costs sit on top, and generally can’t be rolled into your home loan. Getting this straight means you go house-hunting with real numbers instead of a nasty surprise at the finish line.
To see what you can realistically afford in your city, calculate your borrowing power. For a $600,000 house, a 5% deposit is $30,000, a 10% deposit is $60,000, and a 20% deposit (no LMI) is $120,000. The deposit is always a percentage of the purchase price, so the dollar figure scales straight up with the price of the home. You can’t apply directly to Housing Australia – only through a Participating Lender as part of a home loan application.
HECS debt doesn’t change the size of the deposit you need, but it significantly impacts your borrowing power. Because HECS repayments are deducted from your salary, banks see you as having less “disposable income” to pay a mortgage. In 2026, many lenders will ignore HECS debt in their calculations only if the balance is under $5,000 or nearly paid off. Buying a home with a small deposit is the fastest way to stop paying rent, but it isn’t without its challenges.
Our borrowing power calculator shows your real budget in a couple of minutes. These are the schemes that directly cut the deposit you need, or the cash you bring to settlement. The list usually includes doctors, dentists, specialists, pharmacists, optometrists, solicitors, barristers, accountants and engineers. Some lenders extend waivers to nurses, teachers, police and other emergency services workers, though eligibility varies.
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