Home loans for tradies

How lenders view tradies

Trades split into two very different lending stories: PAYG employees, who are straightforward, and self-employed subbies, whose approval depends entirely on how a lender reads their tax returns.

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 tradies

• PAYG wage plus overtime, site and travel allowances, and RDO accruals.
• Self-employed: business profit plus add-backs for depreciation on tools and vehicles, extra super and one-off costs.
• Subcontractor income, sometimes assessable on one year of returns with the right lender.
• Cash-flow lumpiness across project cycles, which needs explanation rather than concealment.

Advantages available to tradies

• Strong demand for trades keeps employment stability high in lender models.
• Generous add-back policy at some lenders adds tens of thousands to assessed self-employed income.
• One-year-of-returns and alt-doc options for recently established sole traders.

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

• Aggressive tax minimisation in the year before applying — each dollar of profit removed costs roughly five to six dollars of borrowing power.
• Vehicle and equipment finance limits assessed at full value, cutting serviceability hard.
• Unlodged tax returns, the most common single cause of a self-employed decline.

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 tradies — 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.