PHOTO: Some Aussies have been preparing for rate rises.
Even a modest $100 rise in monthly mortgage repayments would push close to one in five mortgage holders off a financial cliff, according to analysis by comparison site Finder.com.au.
The research showed small rate rises, the like of which are expected from banks throughout the year, would be unmanageable for hundreds of thousands of Aussie homeowners.
Almost one in four (22 per cent) mortgage holders were already struggling to pay their mortgage repayments, according to Finder’s Consumer Sentiment Tracker.
Finder home loans editor Richard Whitten said higher mortgage costs would be felt immediately by many Aussie households.
“It has been an extraordinary period of ultra-cheap mortgages, and some borrowers have got in over their heads,” Mr Whitten said.
“Many Australians are on edge about a predicted rate rise – lots of these people are already struggling.”
A $100 increase in payments would tip 21 per cent of mortgage holders over the edge, the data showed.
An interest rate rise has been widely predicted for 2022 – with 17 of the 37 experts and economists (46 per cent) polled by separate Finder research expecting a rate increase from the Reserve Bank in the coming year.
Lenders have already begun to raise interest rates on fixed loan product independent of the RBA.
That means a further squeeze on household budgets at a time of rising bills and Covid-19 cases.
House prices rose nationally by 22.1 per cent in 2021, according to CoreLogic, with some capitals recorded even higher gains over the year.
House prices grew by an average of nearly 28 per cent in Sydney last year.
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