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Macquarie Bank, Australia's fifth-largest mortgage lender, has revealed its new approach to negative gearing following last week's Budget announcement. In what was one of the most controversial Budget's in a generation, Labor treasurer Jim Chalmers announced that negative gearing will be reserved only for new residential builds from July next year. Existing residential properties with negative gearing will be 'grandfathered', meaning they will not be affected going forward.

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Markets are still unpacking the 2026 to 2027 federal budget, which was handed down earlier this month.

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Bankwest has introduced a property estimates feature in its mobile app, providing customers with estimated price ranges for residential properties.

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There is a growing gap between the shape of Australian borrowers' financial lives and the shape of the credit assessment tools designed to evaluate them. Higher rates have tightened serviceability. Rising living costs have eaten into savings buffers. A short supply of housing stock has pushed buyers into structures and locations that major lenders have grown cautious about. The result is a widening category of people who can genuinely service a loan but cannot prove it in the terms a major bank's scorecard is prepared to accept.

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Fixed mortgage rates have been edging higher while variable rate changes remain uneven, squeezing borrowing capacity for first-home buyers and property investors alike. Canstar's latest Weekly Rate Wrap-up points to a thinner pool of sharp deals and a more challenging environment for refinancing and new lending. The pressure is most visible at the lower end of the market. There are now 89 home loan rates below 5.75% on Canstar's database, down from 101 the week before, reducing the chances of substantially cutting repayments by switching.

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