Maximise interest savings and enjoy fee waivers when you bundle your mortgage and credit card with one lender.
You can kill two birds with one stone and enjoy massive savings if you bundle your credit card and mortgage with the one bank. This is because many banks offer competitive packages to help reduce the cost of borrowings as long as you bank with them alone. You can now bundle your home loan with personal loans, bank accounts, credit cards, insurance covers and equity trading portfolios. The bigger your bundle, the more discounts and freebies you’ll enjoy. This guide explains how these packages work, how you can benefit from them and the traps to look out for.
What are mortgage and credit card packages?
Personal banking packages are designed to improve banking customer loyalty. By letting you package common banking products and services together and offering discounts with them, banks attract you to do business with them exclusively. Instead of paying multiple fees for multiple products, you pay a single annual package fee.
On top of that, other benefits can include lower home loan interest rates, and loan establishment and administrative fee waivers. If you apply for a credit card you could enjoy annual fee waivers, bank account service fee waivers, and transaction and ATM fee waivers. If you take out life insurance you might receive discounts on general and risk insurance policies including home insurance, car insurance, life insurance, income protection and more. Other perks could also include discounts on financial planning services and share trading brokerage rates and margin lending interest rates, as well as other complementary perks.
Which banks offer credit card and mortgage discount packages?
| Bank | Mortgage and credit card package |
|---|---|
| ANZ |
|
| Citibank |
|
| Macquarie Bank |
|
| NAB |
|
| Suncorp Bank |
|
| Westpac |
|
What to remember when applying for a mortgage and credit card package
- Compare. As with all financial products, make sure to still compare other available options before committing to the one lender. This is because other credit card/mortgage providers may be able to offer you a better deal or feature than this seemingly attractive loan package.
- Consider all inclusions. Make sure that everything included in the package is useful to you, because you might not get full value for your package fee if you’re not utilising the entire package.
- Check minimum requirements. Some requirements may apply. For instance, some loan packages may stipulate that your home loan be in excess of $750,000.
- Read all terms and conditions. Make sure to familiarise yourself with all the details of the package, since some finer print may reduce the suitability of the package. For example, you cannot refinance a loan internally, or enjoy currently advertised discounts on an older loan.
In general, taking out a mortgage and credit card package will yield greater savings for you. Before you select one, however, make sure that you’ve compared packages from other banks, made the necessary calculations and met all the requirements and conditions for your chosen package.
Pictures: Shutterstock
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