Refinancing is a bottomless pit of fees, trap doors, turn-arounds, and obscure rules that make it a struggle for even the most experienced investors, let alone a first home buyer.
As one of the most competitive mortgage brokers in Sydney, Get a Better Rate can simplify the process, reduce your workload, and negotiate on your behalf to get the right loan for you with minimal fuss or fees.
Refinancing home loans can be a time-consuming process that can challenge even the most experienced property owners.
When refinancing, you can expect to encounter the following 5 stages:
Assessment: Assessing your financial situation, existing lender, goals, credit score, debts, market conditions, and potential costs or fees associated with refinancing.
Investigation: Shopping around and inspecting all the local lenders, comparing their details, their associated costs, loan features, and the pros-cons of each. It’s also important to take into consideration the trust they’ve established with their previous customers, as well as their qualifications and authority.
Initiation: Reaching out to the chosen lender with all relevant information covered in your assessment and discussing at length the options available to you, negotiating the details, and maintaining your goals throughout the dialogue.
Closing: Finalising all the details and ensuring no details were overlooked or omitted in the final agreement. Signing all the legal documents, paying all associated fees or costs involved (if any), and settling the new loan.
Monitoring: Evaluating your new loan on a month-to-month basis and checking that goals set during the assessment stage are being met or surpassed. Regularly reviewing the mortgage in accordance with any change in market conditions. Communicating with your broker and lender in case any changes need to be made.
Rather than tackle all of this on your own, our team at Get a Better Rate can personally assess your situation to tailor our approach based on your needs.
Our highest priority is ensuring a smooth, stress-free transition to refinance your home loan while leveraging our principal mortgage broker’s 20+ years of experience to reduce the final amount you have to pay.
The benefits of using a mortgage broker are significant, we can:
Save you time
Provide access to a wider range of lenders
Offer a personalised service to every client
Unlike refinancing with a bank, we commit ourselves to understanding each of our clients and use our expertise to devise tailored approaches based on your specific needs. Consequently, it helps you save both time and money.
While banks may provide a highly standardised service to all their clients, mortgage brokers can personalise their approach to every client based on their financial goals and circumstances.
Banks are firm believers in a “one size fits all” philosophy, which leads to the same solutions having varying success among many clients. A good broker is flexible and able to adapt to your financial needs.
Mortgage brokers that check all of these boxes are few and far between. Enlisting the help of one of our highly trained brokers is as easy as sending us your contact details to arrange your first consultation, free of charge.
| Checklist | Get a Better Rate | Banks |
|---|---|---|
| Fully qualified and licensed. | ✓ | ? |
| Trusted by the community. | ✓ | X |
| Experience with refinancing. | ✓ | ? |
| Access to a wide range of lenders. | ✓ | X |
| No fees. No costs. No extra charges. | ✓ | X |
| Ongoing support after sealing the deal. | ✓ | X |
To further assist you in finding the right mortgage broker to help you refinance your mortgage, we recommend considering the following questions:
1. “How many loans have you closed this year, and how many were refinances?”
This question gives you an idea of the broker’s experience with refinancing and sets your expectations for them.
Due to the current state of the home loan market, many Get a Better Rate clients are looking for new lenders to refinance and adapt to the evolving conditions.
2. “What lenders do you work with?”
A wide variety of lenders can mean more options for you. Get a Better Rate works with 40 vetted lenders, each with an excellent record and trusted by the community.
3. “How are you compensated?”
Some mortgage brokers charge their fees directly to the borrower but not us. Get a Better Rate’s mortgage brokers are paid by the lenders on commission, meaning our clients are guaranteed to save money through our hard work without losing a single cent.
Our mortgage brokers at Get a Better Rate are trained in every aspect of refinancing.
No matter your situation, our experienced team can assist you with whatever option suits you the best.
These are just some examples of what our brokers know:
Rate-and-Term Refinancing: Adjusting the interest rate, the length of the mortgage repayments, or both.
Cash-out Refinancing: Borrowing more than the existing loan and receiving the excess as capital.
Cash-in Refinancing: Paying a lump sum to reduce the total balance during refinancing.
Property Investors Refinancing: Leveraging equity for further investment or restructuring loans for tax purposes.
Fixed to Variable (or vice versa) Refinancing: Switching between fixed and variable interest rates to adapt to market or personal conditions.
Interest-Only Refinancing: Paying only the interest for a set period.
Bridging Finance: Bridging the difference when buying a new home before selling the old one.
Divorce or Separation Refinancing: Refinancing to remove one party’s name from the loan.
Commercial Properties Refinancing: Refinancing business properties such as to secure a better rate or release equity.
Loan Portability: Moving a loan to a new property to avoid a full refinance and save fees.
No-Cost Refinancing: Refinancing without upfront fees, often at slightly higher interest rates.
If one of these sounds like what you had in mind, feel free to reach out to us, and a member of our very flexible team will step forward to lend their expertise to your situation.
Get a Better Rate has proudly served the community for over 7 years.
Don’t just take our word for it. Take the word of your fellow Sydneysiders who got a better rate.
Our job is to make all of this as easy and stress-free as possible for you. All we need from you are your goals, your financial circumstances, and your contact details.
In our consultation, we will assess your circumstances, what options are available to you, and how we can streamline the entire process while saving you money on unnecessary costs.
Afterwards, we’ll take it from there. You can spend quality time focusing on other things while our team works to bring you a better deal.
The factors that influence how long this process takes include document gathering, loan complexity, the efficiency of your broker, the workload of the lender themselves, and an appraisal of your current home loan if necessary.
In our experience, the process averages 30-45 days. However, having the assistance of a professional mortgage broker may reduce this time. Conversely, refinancing may take even more time if you decide to handle it alone or try going through a bank.
Get a Better Rate prides itself on the experience, diligence, and trustworthiness of its experienced mortgage brokers to make refinancing something easy and accessible to everyone.
To book a free consultation with Peter Hammond and take your first step to saving money, simply follow these easy steps:
Click here to send us your contact details.
A member of our team will get back to you.
We will book a time that works best for you.
A professional mortgage broker can negotiate on your behalf to reduce fees and additional charges associated with a home loan refinancing move. As a result, using a mortgage broker can actually reduce the final cost.
A mortgage broker is typically either compensated by a commission the lender pays OR by the borrower directly as a flat fee or a percentage of the loan amount.
Get a Better Rate’s mortgage brokers fall into the former category: We take our payment from lenders, not clients. Thus, we can guarantee our clients will save money from our services.
The standard items to bring with you to your first consultation include:
Your current mortgage statement
Proof of income
Credit history
Property tax bills
Lenders mortgage insurance details
Information on any debts you have
