Your loan refinance settled, what do I do now?

You’ve just settled your home loan refinance – there’s bound to be questions

1. What happens to my old home loan? On the day of settlement, it will be paid down to a zero balance, then within 48 hours you can expect the loan to “disappear” from your online banking. This is completely normal


2. What happens to my offset accounts & other transaction accounts at the outgoing lender? – If you had an account linked in an offset arrangement, that account will remain active; however, it will be “downgraded” to a standard banking transaction account, receiving no interest offset benefit.

If you also hold transaction accounts at the outgoing lender, those accounts will remain active, and if you want to keep using them, you are more than welcome to do so.

Just be mindful, some bank transaction accounts may attract a small monthly fee.


3. When is my first home loan repayment? – This can vary, but in most cases, the first repayment will fall one month directly after settlement.

For all of our customers, we will email you a detailed PDF settlement summary within 5 business days post settlement.  This will include useful information, such as repayment date, repayment amount and your account details.

A good thing to remember is that while we can assist with many things, there are some items that you will need to go directly to the bank for due to privacy reasons, but we will always be sure to point you in the right direction.


Additional recommendations we’d like to share with you

Firstly – Make sure you have access to your online banking – install the banking app on your phone, login, familiarise yourself, get comfy.

Secondly – Get your money moving – you will want to move money from your old offset account into your new offset account, same applies for those who prefer to use redraw in place of an offset an account.

If your moving large amounts of money, it can benefit you to pay for a real time transfer) to move all the money in one transaction – banks will charge you approximately $30, but in many cases this is well worth it.

Thirdly. Don’t immediately panic about direct debits and updating them right away, you can leave some money in your “old accounts” to continue those direct debits in the interim with no issues.

Then as you have some time, start to move them across to your new banking if that’s your preferred setup.

Final recommendation. For those that have just refinanced an investment loan, you can save your old statements now in readiness for your upcoming tax return.

If you forget to do this, no issue, you can still obtain necessary information from the bank even after the loan is closed at a much later date.

As always, If you have any further questions, please don’t hesitate to reach to out to someone from The Lending Alliance team: https://thelendingalliance.com.au/contact