It just got even harder for first-home buyers who have deposits of less than 20 percent to get a mortgage.
Westpac has become the third major bank to limit mortgages following a pause of low deposit lending by ASB and ANZ.
They put it on the Reserve Bank restricting LVRs - Loan to Value Ratios - which mean only 10 percent of a bank’s lending can go to borrowers with a deposit of less than 20 percent.
Financial advisor and founder of The Money Men, Josh Farry, broke down the details of the issue with Tova on Thursday morning.
"It's pretty tough out there, Farry said.
"There's just been layers and layers of things put on to people just borrowing money in general.
"First home buyers that I'm talking to I've never seen them online seeking out information, trying to use the grants, they finally got some better tools from the government now.
"But they just keep getting hit with further and further hurdles and test rates and stuff going up, it is hard.
Farry said LVR's are there for a good reason as New Zealand doesn't want to end up in kind of GFC-type levels of defaults,
"The interesting time this time I guess is the communication that we've had from the banks, the ones that have closed the door have just said we're going to close it for a few months.
"They use the traffic light system where they go, we're open now, we're closed now, we're a little bit open for existing clients."
Listen to the full interview between Josh Farry and Tova above.
You can also download the full interview on the Tova podcast, and listen on the go. Check it out on the rova app or wherever you get your podcasts.
