NZ’s largest lender joins investor crackdown

Lynn Grieveson

ANZ New Zealand, which is the country’s biggest mortgage lender, has joined ASB Bank in restricting highly leveraged lending to property investors as the housing market continues to boom.

Like the CBA-owned ASB Bank last week, ANZ has decided to reimpose loan to valuation restrictions off its own bat without waiting for the Reserve Bank of New Zealand to bring back restrictions, as it is proposing to do from April 1 next year.

The decision will mean the minimum deposit required from property investors will increase to 30 percent, from the current 20 percent. Pre-approvals are unaffected.

“As a responsible lender, it’s important for us to help customers make good borrowing decisions, and that customers have a level of borrowing they can comfortably pay back,” ANZ said.

NAB subsidiary Bank of New Zealand said it was still monitoring the situation. Westpac NZ said its lending settings were already in line with the previous LVR settings that were altered by the RBNZ in March due to the COVID mortgage deferral scheme.