{"id":860015,"date":"2026-09-25T09:42:08","date_gmt":"2026-09-25T09:42:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/860015\/"},"modified":"2026-09-25T09:42:08","modified_gmt":"2026-09-25T09:42:08","slug":"australian-homebuyers-name-4-9-as-their-magic-mortgage-rate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/860015\/","title":{"rendered":"Australian homebuyers name 4.9% as their magic mortgage rate"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Across the survey, prospective buyers were more rate-driven than recent buyers. Some 30% of future buyers said a specific rate would be their signal to apply, compared with 20% of recent buyers, who were more often prompted by life events.<\/p>\n<p>That wait-and-see stance is showing up in lending activity. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.brokernews.com.au\/news\/breaking-news\/mortgage-demand-settles-into-a-lower-baseline-as-rate-hikes-bite-289793.aspx\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Equifax data has tracked months of falling mortgage demand<\/a>, with applications down 14.1% year on year in August 2026, a fifth straight monthly decline, and first-home buyer applications down 20%.<\/p>\n<p>Cotality chief economist Selma Hepp (pictured left) cautioned that holding out for a target rate carries its own cost.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s expensive to buy a home. But so is renting,&#8221; Hepp said.<\/p>\n<p>Buyers reshape the loan, not just the budget<\/p>\n<p>Beyond the household budget, Australian buyers are also reworking the loan itself. Some 63% would take a smaller mortgage and 57% would settle for a smaller home, both slightly below the five-market averages of 65% and 59%. A further 58% would pursue a no-cost or smaller refinance to reduce their debt, just above the 57% average.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Across the survey, prospective buyers were more rate-driven than recent buyers. Some 30% of future buyers said a&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":860016,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[363029,28,363030,101,44656],"class_list":["post-860015","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-australian-homebuyers","tag-business","tag-consumer-sentiment-report","tag-economy","tag-housing-affordability"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/860015","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=860015"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/860015\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/860016"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=860015"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=860015"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=860015"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}