Application Process

A Home Loan Advice Centre loan consultant will go over your personal situation. We spend about 10 minutes talking to you to understand what you would like to do and to get a picture of your current financial situation.

We assess your borrowing capacity, and recommend loans most suited to you amongst all the major lenders. We provide you with a loan report showing a breakdown of costs and an indication of the loan repayments you can expect for the size of loan you require.

From all this information, you choose the lender and the loan you prefer.

We gather all the required documentation (see documents required check list) and submit to the lender.

In general, there is no cost to apply for pre-approval and it usually takes between 2 to 5 days for us to receive it.

When received, we advise you, and go over the conditions of the pre-approval.

You are ready to search for your property knowing the value of property you can afford. See the Home Loan Advice Centre house hunting guide for a guide to choosing the right property.

When a suitable property is found, inform your Home Loan Advice Centre loan consultant so that they can confirm the property is acceptable security for the lender.

It is also good practice to inform your conveyancer. If required, they can do all necessary checks ie strata search, building report, pest inspection etc. (Home Loan Advice Centre has a number of quality conveyancers we can recommend to you if required – call us on 02-9210-1000)

When you’ve decided on a property, Home Loan Advice Centre can give you tips on successful bidding technique.

The actual purchase should be done liasing with your conveyancer to ensure proper procedure is followed.

Once the contract of sale is signed, this needs to be faxed to Home Loan Advice Centre so we can request the lender to start the settlement process.

Home Loan Advice Centre sends your property details to the lender and, if all is in order, the lender proceeds to grant unconditional approval.

Note – a valuation may be required by the bank before unconditional approval is granted and some conveyancers may recommend you receive unconditional approval before fully completing the purchase agreement.

Once unconditional approval is received and your conveyancer has enacted exchange of the contracts, your bank will prepare loan offer documents (these documents constitute the formal loan contract between you and the lender) and mail them to you. Once signed, the loan offer documents are sent back to the bank and mortgage documents are then sent to your conveyancer in preparation for settlement.

Note – some lenders send mortgage documents and loan offer documents together as one pack to the client for signing.

Your conveyancer manages and conducts the settlement of the property with the bank and the vendor of the property on the agreed settlement day.

You receive the keys to your new property and can move in!