Get started on your mortgage
Buying your first home, investing in property or just keen to review your mortgage?
Fill out our online application
Find out which Squirrel loan is right for you
Get a Squirrel Loan
A cost effective Bridging Loan
Many people prefer to buy a new home before selling their existing one. That's why we’ve come up with a bridging loan to take the headache out of moving house.
Now you can upgrade to the right property at the right time without selling your current home first.
Get started
Move house on your terms.
Benefits of a Squirrel bridging loan:
- Borrow up to 80% of the combined property value
- Lower interest rates
- Less fees
- Flexible payment options
When it comes to buying and selling we’ll look at all the options and help you work out the best strategy to buy and sell. Whether that’s our bridging loan or one from our banking partners, or if you even need to bridge at all.
Squirrel can fund up to 80% of the value of your new property and existing property combined.
- The amount we are prepared to lend may be impacted by location or the type of house
- This type of loan is only available for homeowners buying and selling their owner-occupied home.
Our current bridging mortgage rate is from 6.95%p.a.
Priority is given to existing Squirrel clients
We have limited funding available for bridging loans. If you need to bridge a loan, it's important that you get advice early in the process and that you lock in your funding (if required).
- Existing Squirrel broker clients who purchased their last home through our advisers
- Existing client approvals
- New to Squirrel clients who have already purchased
1. Get approved to buy a new home (subject to sale of yours)
2. Find a property
3. We'll arrange bridging finance
4. Sell your existing home
5. Bridging loan is repaid and your lending is moved to the bank
Are there any fees?
As with any bridging loan, there are fees involved. Squirrel charge 0.50% of the amount borrowed with a minimum fee of $5,000. $1,000 of the fee is payable up front on approval.
When are the fees payable?
|
When |
Fee payable |
Benefit |
|
On approval |
$1,000 |
Gives you the ability to buy at auction or go unconditional |
|
On acceptance |
0.50% of the amount to be borrowed (min. of $5,000 less $1,000 already paid |
We reserve funding for settlement |
The full bridging fee is payable even if you don’t draw down funding because we have to reserve funding from the point you accept our finance offer.
There are no additional costs if you do not need the funding (your current homes sells in time).
We won't push you towards a product that doesn't work for you
Bridging loans are arranged by our mortgage advisers so the first step is to do an application for a new purchase. Your Squirrel adviser will get you approved for that with one of the banks and if the bank is happy to bridge your existing property then that will be the cheapest way of bridging. If they aren’t prepared to (and often they aren’t) that’s where Squirrel can step in. We can give you access to our bridging loan.
Once you buy and lock in our funding the rest of the bridging fee is payable. It doesn’t have to be paid until either the house sells or the loan draws down in which case the fee is added to the loan.
What's the alternative to a bridging finance?
You can buy with a long settlement date and then sell in the interim period. It would still reduce your risk for us to approve bridging finance just in case you don’t sell in time.
Alternatively you can sell first with a long settlement and then try to buy. The challenge with this approach is you might get locked out of the market or might not find the right property and compromise your next purchase.
Camielle
Whanganui, New Zealand
Tim was amazing he was happy polite very friendly and super helpful and kept in touch the whole time and we knew what was going on and no worries. He went above and beyond for us, we will be back in two years!C
Stephen
Tauranga , New Zealand
Anna was an absolute star - we cannot thank her enough for her unwavering support and guidance to make a stressful experience that much easier.S
Kurt
New Zealand
Brad was able to re-fix our mortgage quickly and easily and got us a really great deal. Very happy with the process and result!K
Amelia
New Zealand
Squirrel has been easy to work with, the staff have been really clear and quick working. As well as enjoyable to work withA
Christopher
Auckland, New Zealand
Emma Wallace is an absolute superstar, she kept us informed, responded in a timely manner, and was super clear about what she needed from us and what we could expect from her. The most painless part of buying the house was dealing with SquirrelC
Svend
Christchurch, New Zealand
Thanks Eleanor for the help with our mortgage for new property down in CHCH. Eleanor was great when we secured our first home in Auckland, and had another great result when we sold up and moved to Christchurch using Squirrel again.S
David
Christchurch, New Zealand
I was referred from my partner who saw an ad for squirrel, the best advice ever. Absolutely no hassle from Jess and she also got me a better Rate!!D
Ben
Auckland, New Zealand
Brad was fantastic, really responsive and answered all of our many questions despite our situation changing regularly. Thanks for all your help!B
