Home loans for small business owners

How lenders view small business owners

Your accountant's job is to minimise your taxable income; a lender's job is to assess it. Those two goals conflict, and bridging the gap is where add-backs and the right lender matter most.

Two lenders assessing the identical payslip can arrive at borrowing power figures more than $100,000 apart, purely from policy differences. Choosing the lender whose policy matches your income shape is worth far more than shaving a few basis points off the rate.

Income lenders will assess for small business owners

• Net profit from your last one to two years of company and personal tax returns.
• Add-backs: depreciation, one-off expenses, interest on debts being refinanced, superannuation above the minimum, and your own rent where the business pays it.
• Retained profits in the company, counted by lenders that assess the full group structure.
• Business activity statements or business bank statements under alt-doc policy where returns are behind.

Advantages available to small business owners

• One-year-returns policy at multiple lenders where you have prior industry experience.
• Alt-doc lending using BAS or 6–12 months of business bank statements, at a modest rate premium.
• Correct add-backs frequently lift assessable income by 20–40% over the taxable figure.

Lenders mortgage insurance

There's no standard occupation-based LMI waiver for your profession, but a 5% deposit is still achievable through the First Home Guarantee, and a family guarantor can remove LMI entirely.

Common mistakes we see

• Applying with the taxable income figure and no add-back schedule prepared.
• Outstanding ATO debt, which most lenders treat as a serious adverse signal.
• Late-lodged returns, which push you into alt-doc territory unnecessarily.

What to have ready before you apply

• Two recent payslips showing year-to-date gross, plus your latest income statement or PAYG summary.
• Three months of transaction statements for every account, including any buy-now-pay-later facility.
• Details of all debts and credit limits — lenders assess the limit, not the balance.
• For self-employed income: the last one to two years of tax returns and notices of assessment.
• Evidence of your deposit, its source, and how long it's been held.

How much could you borrow?

Our borrowing power calculator assesses at a 3% serviceability buffer, the same way a lender does, and applies a HEM living-expense floor. It's an estimate — the number that matters is the one from the lender whose policy best fits small business owners — but it's a realistic starting point.

If you'd rather skip the guesswork, a 15-minute chat gets you a lender-specific figure with the policy quirks already applied.