ASB — one of New Zealand’s large Australian-owned banks — has lowered some longer-term mortgage and deposit rates.
Its three-year rate will drop 26 basis points from 6.65% to 6.39%, with the four-year rate falling 10 points from 6.49% to 6.39%.
Some of its longer-term deposit rates have fallen by between 10 and 20 basis points.
Last week ASB lowered mortgage rates on its six-month, one-year and four-year loans.
“This is the eighth time we’ve dropped mortgage rates this year,” executive general manager for personal banking Adam Boyd said.
“We intend to do as much as we can to take the pressure off our existing homeowners and prospective home buyers despite the Official Cash Rate remaining flat at 5.50%. The slight decrease in wholesale rates, which is the rate at which the bank is borrowing money, means we can adjust our rates to benefit our customers looking to borrow.”
Earlier this week Kiwibank and BNZ cut some rates, but times remain tough for many mortgage holders.
Earlier this month the Reserve Bank released its six-monthly Financial Stability report, which contained a stark warning that homeowners were increasingly falling into mortgage strife — with the number affected set to increase by the end of this year.
“Difficulty in keeping up with payments has likely been made worse by cost-of-living pressures and other unforeseen events like job losses,” the central bank said, adding people aged between 30 and 50 were at the most risk.
