The comparison
Almost every page offering to compare rates for you is paid when you become a lead. Here is how to do it yourself, and what the headline number leaves out.
What to gather
Comparison is meaningless until you know what you are comparing against. Collect these first and the entire exercise takes ten minutes instead of an afternoon.
For scale while you work: the average rate on outstanding owner occupier loans was 6.20% in May 2026.1 If your rate is well above that, the gap is not a market problem, it is a you-and-your-lender problem, and it is fixable.
1 Reserve Bank of Australia, Statistical Table F6, data to 31 May 2026, retrieved 26 July 2026.
The comparison rate
The comparison rate exists because a headline rate can hide fees. It rolls most standard charges into one figure so that a 5.89% loan with a $395 annual fee can be weighed against a 6.04% loan with none. That is a real service and it is worth using.
The limitation is in the standardisation. Comparison rates are calculated on a fixed example loan, conventionally $150,000 over 25 years. If your balance is $600,000, the fee component of that figure is roughly four times too heavy for your situation, which systematically flatters no-fee loans and penalises packaged ones. It also cannot capture anything conditional: break costs, valuation fees, or what happens at the end of an introductory period.
Use it to sort a list. Do not use it as the final answer. Published rate tables such as Canstar's lowest variable rates are useful for the same reason and with the same caveat.2
2 Canstar, Home Loan Comparison, lowest variable rates table dated 2 July 2026, retrieved 26 July 2026.
Who is paid
Most rate comparison pages are lead generation. The site is paid when you submit your details, and the ordering of the table can reflect commercial arrangements rather than price alone. Research on how many Australian borrowers are missing out on mortgage savings is genuinely useful,3 and it is usually published by companies that also monetise the click. Both things are true at once.
This is not an accusation, it is a reading instruction. Treat comparison tables as a shortlist generator, then verify each shortlisted rate on the lender's own site, where the eligibility conditions are stated in full. The rate that survives that check is the one worth quoting to your current lender.
3 Finder, research on missed mortgage savings, 30 June 2026.
The order to do it in
The ACCC found borrowers missing out on significant savings by not switching.4 But switching is the last resort, not the first, because it is the most expensive thing on this list in time and paperwork.
And then it drifts again. The loyalty tax reopens after every repricing, which is why comparing once is a task and comparing regularly is the actual job. Ratey does the regular part: a free home loan health check re-run every month against more than 35 Australian lenders, with no lead form at the end of it.
4 ACCC, Home Loan Price Inquiry, 5 December 2020.
Questions
It folds most standard fees into a single figure so two loans can be compared on more than the headline rate. It is genuinely useful and it is also standardised on a $150,000 loan over 25 years, which almost nobody has. Use it to rank loans, not to predict what yours will cost.
Because advertised rates usually assume the best case: owner occupier, principal and interest, and a loan to value ratio under 80% or sometimes under 60%. If your circumstances differ on any of those, your rate does too. Knowing your LVR before you start tells you which advertised tier you are actually eligible for.
No. Most comparison sites list lenders they have commercial arrangements with, and the ordering can reflect those arrangements. That does not make them useless, it makes them a starting point rather than a complete market view. Cross-check anything promising against the lender's own site.
No, though it is usually close. A slightly higher rate with an offset account you will genuinely use can beat a sharper rate without one. So can a lender that will actually approve you. The lowest advertised rate in the market is only relevant if you qualify for it and the product suits how you handle money.
More than it looks. On a $600,000 balance, a quarter of a percentage point is about $1,500 a year before compounding, and that continues for as long as the loan runs. Small gaps are worth chasing precisely because they persist quietly rather than arriving as a bill.
Sources
Market figures are point in time published figures, checked each time this page is reviewed.
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Ratey
Working it out once tells you where you stand today. It moves as your balance falls and the market shifts, and the moments worth acting on are easy to miss. Ratey re-runs your free home loan health check every month against more than 35 Australian lenders, tracks your property value, equity and LVR, and tells you when something is worth doing.
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