Paramedic home loans: LMI waivers, your roster, and buying with less than 20%

Can a paramedic get an LMI waiver?

Not at the lenders Money Brain has checked. None of the eleven lender groups whose LMI waiver policy we hold names paramedics [1][2][3][4]. Ten of them leave paramedics out or have no professional waiver at all, and the eleventh, Bank First, writes its waiver for healthcare workers buying a first home without listing roles (part 2). A paramedic avoids LMI the same ways anyone can: a 20% deposit or, as a first home buyer, the government's 5% Deposit Scheme (part 8).

LMI is insurance the lender takes out when you borrow more than 80% of the price, and you pay for it. LVR is the loan as a share of the property's price, so 80% LVR means a 20% deposit. On a $630,000 loan at 90% LVR, LMI runs to about $16,900 on one insurer's rate card (part 6) [7].

Most professional waivers are written for doctors, dentists, lawyers and accountants, with some allied health roles added. Paramedics aren't on any of the waiver lists we hold.

Does St.George or Westpac waive LMI for paramedics?

No. St.George and Westpac don't waive LMI for paramedics: their waiver, shared across the Westpac Group banks, names registered nurses, midwives and other health roles, and paramedics aren't on the list [1][5]. St.George's page speaks of "healthcare and emergency service professions", but the roles on its LMI waiver list are health roles such as registered nurses and midwives, and paramedics aren't among them [5].

Where St.George does name paramedics is a different list: the roles whose overtime and allowances it can count at 100%. Front-line ambulance officers and front-line paramedics are on it. It's not for office-based emergency services staff or the self-employed, and St.George wants your income evidence to be with the same employer for at least 6 months; under that, it says an application may still be referred [5].

Counting more of your income changes how much you can borrow. It doesn't change whether you pay LMI. So for a paramedic, St.George's offer is about borrowing power, not about the deposit (part 12).

Do paramedics get cheaper home loan rates?

Money Brain holds no paramedic-specific rate from any of the lender groups it checked, and none of their waiver policies has a paramedic group [1][2][3][4]. Some lenders advertise packages for essential workers. Whether one is cheaper for you comes down to the whole cost: the rate, the fees and the features, over the years you'll keep the loan.

A small rate gap is real money. On a $630,000 loan over 30 years, 0.25% is about $100 a month in repayments [13]. So a discount is worth having only if the rate it's taken off was competitive to begin with (part 10).

If you're also registered and working as a nurse, the nurse rules are different: see nurse home loans.

How much is LMI on a paramedic's home loan?

Here's what LMI would cost a paramedic at 90% and 95% of the price, from one insurer's published rate card [7]. Standard rates apply to most buyers; first home buyers get a slightly lower rate.

These figures are illustrations from one insurer's card, not quotes. Your premium depends on the insurer, the loan and the lender.

What this means for you: going from a 10% deposit to a 5% deposit on a $700,000 home nearly doubles the LMI, from about $16,900 to about $30,500. That's why the 5% Deposit Scheme, which removes LMI altogether, is worth so much to a first home buyer under the price cap.

Low deposit home loans for paramedics: your ways in with less than 20%

A paramedic has five ways to buy with less than a 20% deposit, and none of them depends on your job title. The right one depends on your price, your savings, whether it's your first home, and how much of your pay a lender counts.

Which way comes out ahead is worked out on your numbers, not picked from a list. Paying LMI can be the right answer if it gets you in years sooner. See First Home Guarantee, guarantor home loans, Help to Buy, the 5% Deposit Scheme or a guarantor and the first home buyer grants in your state.

Paramedic first home buyer? The 5% Deposit Scheme and its price caps

A paramedic buying a first home can use the government's 5% Deposit Scheme, which lets you buy with a 5% deposit and no LMI, because Housing Australia guarantees the lender in place of LMI [8]. The scheme has no job test, no income caps and no waitlist. Single parents and legal guardians can buy with 2%.

You must be 18 or older, a citizen or permanent resident, live in the home, and not have owned property in the past 10 years. You can apply alone or with one other person. The home can be an existing house, townhouse or apartment, a house and land package, vacant land with a separate contract to build, or off the plan [8].

The price and the lender's valuation must both be at or under the cap for the area. "Regional centres" is a short, named list: in Queensland, the Gold Coast and the Sunshine Coast; in Victoria, Geelong; in NSW, the Central Coast, Coffs Harbour-Grafton, the Illawarra, the Mid North Coast, Richmond-Tweed, and Newcastle and Lake Macquarie. Everywhere else in those states takes the rest-of-state cap [8]:

Two rules matter for paramedics who get posted around. The deposit has a ceiling as well as a floor: if you have 20% or more saved after your purchase costs, the loan isn't eligible. And while the guarantee is in place you must live in the home; it can't be rented out [8]. The scheme also can't be combined with Help to Buy (part 9).

When a no-LMI offer costs more than paying LMI

A no-LMI offer only saves you money if its rate is close to the best rate you could get elsewhere. On a $630,000 loan over 30 years, a rate 0.25% higher costs about $1,600 in extra interest in the first year and about $15,700 over ten years [13]. Keep the loan longer than about eleven years and the higher rate has cost more than the $16,884 of LMI it saved (part 6).

The same sum works on an essential-worker package or a member discount. And a lender that charges LMI but counts all your overtime can be the better loan if it lets you buy the home you need. Compare the whole cost: the rate, the fees, how much of your pay is counted, and how long you'll keep the loan.

How lenders count a paramedic's pay

A paramedic's base salary is the easy part: lenders count it in full. What changes your borrowing is how a lender treats everything else on your payslip: overtime, shift penalties, allowances, on-call and higher duties, salary packaging, and part-time or casual hours. Lenders differ, and the difference can be thousands of dollars a year of counted income.

The next parts set out St.George's published rule for paramedics and the rules of the lenders whose credit policy Money Brain has read, in our own words [5][6]. Where we haven't verified a lender's rule, it's left out rather than guessed: CommBank and Bank First aren't in these parts for that reason, so ask us about them directly.

Overtime: which lenders count 100% of a paramedic's overtime?

St.George is the lender that names paramedics: it counts 100% of a front-line paramedic's overtime and allowances once your income evidence covers 6 months with the same employer [5]. ANZ counts 80% of overtime, and NAB, Bankwest and Macquarie count 80% for a worker outside their nurse and essential-services rules [6]. Suncorp's policy, as we hold it, doesn't state the share.

Bankwest and Macquarie count 100% for essential industries or services, but the wording we hold names nurses, hospital and medical workers, and health services, not paramedics or ambulance services. Westpac Group's credit policy, as we hold it, counts 80% of overtime outside its emergency services rule, and the part of that rule we hold names hospital staff [6]. So whether your overtime counts in full at those lenders is a question we put to each of them for you.

What this means for you: if overtime is a big part of your pay, the lender's rule can change your borrowing more than the rate does. A lender that counts 80% of $20,000 of overtime counts $16,000; one that counts 100% counts all $20,000.

On-call, recall and higher duties pay

On-call, recall and higher duties pay are the parts of a paramedic's payslip a lender finds hardest to count. None of the lender rules Money Brain has on record names on-call or recall pay by that name, so how it's counted depends on how your payslip shows it, as an allowance or as overtime, and on that lender's rule for it (parts 12 and 13). ANZ's policy says plainly that it doesn't count higher-duties pay or one-off payments [6].

If you've been acting up long enough that it's your normal role, an employer letter confirming the higher rate and how long it will last can help a lender see it as ongoing. Payslips and last year's income statement that show the pattern help too.

Salary packaging: can it help a paramedic borrow more?

It can. Employees of public ambulance services can package up to $17,000 a year without fringe benefits tax. That's a grossed-up amount, per employee [10].

Packaged pay is tax-free, so the same pay can leave you more to repay a loan with. Some lenders count that tax-free part as income in its own right, which can raise what you can borrow. The ATO's list of employers exempt from fringe benefits tax includes public ambulance services [10]. Lenders don't all treat packaging the same way:

Macquarie and ING also have packaging rules, written for public health workers and health workers. Whether either reads a paramedic's packaging that way isn't stated in the policy text we hold, so it's a question we put to them [6].

What this means for you: two paramedics on the same ambulance service pay can get different borrowing answers simply because one lender counts their packaging as tax-free income and another adds it back differently, or not at all without paperwork. Bring your packaging statement along with your payslips.

State ambulance service or ABN: does it change the loan?

Yes. How you're paid decides which rules a lender uses. Employed by a state ambulance service, you're paid through payroll, so lenders read your payslips and a letter from your employer. That's the straightforward case, and it's the one St.George's 100% overtime rule is written for [5].

Private, event or industrial work on an ABN is different. Most lenders read it as self-employed income and ask for tax returns, usually two years of them. St.George says self-employed contractors are assessed under its self-employed income rules, while casual employees and PAYG contractors can still have 100% of overtime and allowances considered [5].

If you do both, a lender can count your payroll income on the employee rules and your ABN income on the self-employed rules, each with its own history. See self-employed home loans.

Graduate paramedics and new starters

A graduate paramedic can get a home loan, but lenders want to see you've started and been paid, and some ask for more time. At Westpac, a loan without mortgage insurance needs you to have started and received at least one pay. A mortgage-insured loan needs 3 months in the job, or less than that with 12 months in the same occupation and no gap of more than 2 months between jobs [6].

Your overtime is the part that waits longest. St.George counts 100% of it once your income evidence covers 6 months with the same employer, and says an application without that history may still be referred [5]. Have your letter of offer, your registration and your first payslips ready.

Just moved up a pay level? Westpac accepts the new base pay from an employer's letter, email or contract giving it, plus one payslip at the new rate [6]. So at Westpac a pay rise doesn't have to wait months to count.

On parental leave, or going back to work

You can buy while on parental leave. Westpac can use your return-to-work pay, base pay only, with a letter from your employer giving your return date, your hours and your pay. Every child counts as a dependant, including one not yet born [6].

If your first repayment falls before you return, you'll need to show savings that cover the gap, on top of the money for the purchase. With a mortgage-insured loan in that case, Westpac won't lend for an investment [6].

How much can a paramedic borrow?

How much a paramedic can borrow comes down to three things: what a lender counts of your pay, your debts, and your living costs. Banks then check you could still make the repayments if rates were 3 percentage points higher, the buffer APRA expects [11]. APRA also caps loans to people whose debts are six or more times their income at 20% of each bank's new home lending [11].

That's why the same paramedic can get quite different answers from two lenders. One that counts all your overtime, penalties, allowances and packaging can lend noticeably more than one that counts part of each. See how much can I borrow.

Buying with a partner who isn't a paramedic

You can, and your partner's income counts toward what you can borrow together in the usual way. Because no lender Money Brain checked has a paramedic LMI waiver, there's no paramedic condition for your partner to meet at those lenders [1][2][3][4].

Two things to watch. At ANZ, if the loan has LMI and one of you is casual, the casual can't be the only or main earner [6]. And Help to Buy's joint income cap of $165,000 applies to you both together [9].

Buying an investment property as a paramedic

A paramedic buys an investment property on the same lender rules as anyone else: none of the lenders Money Brain checked has a paramedic waiver to help, so above 80% you'd pay LMI [1][2][3][4]. The 5% Deposit Scheme is only for a home you live in [8]. St.George says what its page offers can apply across variable and fixed loans, whether you're buying to live in or to invest [5].

Once you own one property, the order you buy the next ones in decides whether you can keep going. That's the work we enjoy most: see using equity to buy an investment property.

What does a mortgage broker cost a paramedic?

How a broker is paid, and the rule Money Brain holds against it, is set out in full on its own page: what a mortgage broker costs.

Your first move

You've read the rules. Now there's one question left: which way in, with which lender, for your roster, at the price you want? That depends on whether it's your first home, how you're employed, your overtime and allowances, and your deposit, and it's what Money Brain works out before anything goes to a lender.

When you're ready, the closing section below is the simplest way to start.