South Coast home owners who have a mortgage with Horizon Bank will get some relief this month with the bank deciding to keep its interest rates on hold.
CEO, Jon Stanfield, told East Coast Radio, Horizon Bank has elected to leave interest rates unchanged for existing home and investment variable rate borrowers, despite the 0.25 per cent cash rate hike by the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) on Tuesday (March 7).
“We’ve made the decision to hold rates as they are, so our customers will be spared this increase,” Stanfield said.
“It’s obviously been a really tough period for borrowers that’s impacting a lot of people very hard,” he said.
“For our customers, they’re spared the increase in their repayments which means more money back into people’s household budgets and we think that’s really important at this time.”
The RBA’s decision on Tuesday to increase the cash rate by 25 basis points marked the 10th increase in a row.
The cash rate currently sits at 3.60% – the highest level since May 2012.
“We think it’s time borrowers got a break, so in this case, we’re going to let this one go through to the keeper,” Stanfield said.
“As a customer-owned financial institution, Horizon exists for the benefit of our members, not to maximise profit for investor shareholders. As such, Horizon is always seeking to balance the interests of our borrowers and depositors, and on this occasion the RBA increase will not be applied to existing home and investment variable rate loans.”
For any homeowners with a mortgage that are struggling in the South East, Stanfield has recommended speaking with Horizon or your current lender.
“The earlier it is you can work out an arrangement with your bank to either change your repayments or depending on your circumstances, suspend repayments for a period of time, the better,” Stanfield said.
“There are hardship provisions that are available for all consumers as well.”
If hardships have gone beyond that point – Lifeline can be contacted on 13 11 14.
Image: Horizon Bank
