Historical bank mortgage rates

I'm in the market for a home loan.

I note that the banks currently have slightly different interest rates which range from CBA 5.74% through to Westpac, ANZ 5.91%.

Just wondering if there is a website which lists what what the standard variable interest rates have been in the past 2-3 years and compares each of the big banks.

I am interested to know if with each increase or decrease, do the banks tend to leapfrog each other as to who ends up higher or lower, OR is one particular bank always lower than others.

In the examples above, Westpac was still higher before the recent drop in rates and remains one of the highest now. Will this possbly be reversed in the future.

 

My understanding off the top of my head (please confirm for yourself) is that bank rates are largely determined by their cost of funding, but a bank's source of money can vary greatly.

So for the big four a lot of their money comes from the domestic money market which is largely influenced by the RBA's cash rate, but they still source quite a bit of money from international money markets, which is why when LIBOR spikes up it can affect all banks. This is also why a lot of smaller lenders that were sourcing their money from international markers tanked when LIBOR spiked last year.

Anyway, the cost at which institutions like Australian banks can get money is largely influenced by their credit ratings. Up until recently you would have heard politicians always totting that Australia's four biggest banks had a rating of AA and were some of the best in the world, but off the top of my head three of those four recently had their creidt ratings downgraded, which I expect will ultimately lead to them slightly upping their rates in the near future as their cost of funding has no doubt increased (or as is more likely they will not fully pass on the next rate cuts from the RBA).

Often you hear people talk about how banks like Suncorp, Bendigo, Bank of QLD etc struggling to compete with the big four, this is because these smaller institutions don't have the same credit ratings as the bigger institutions which means they have a higher cost of capital which eats into their profits which is often why they try to compete on service rather than price.

Anyway, if you are looking for greater security sticking with one of the big four likely to be the most secure and cost effective way of taking out a loan over the long term given that they are big institutions with good credit ratings that source a large proportion of their money from domestic markets.

In answer to your questions as to what each banks rate's were over the last two years, I'm unfortunately don't have that information though would love to review it myself.

Though if you are looking to compare banks and interest rates I find RateCity.com.au is always fairly useful.

I should point out I'm not 100% certain about all of this, I'd fully appreciate some reclarification myself from someone who is more entrenched in the industry.

 

Hi Blinky Bill,

I was wondering if you had any luck find a site with 2-3 years of SVRs for the main banks....

I have been looking everywhere, and I can't find a site anywhere... cityrates and similar only have current rates, not historical.

Cheers

C