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Stop Scaring The Bank: Save, Settle, Sort Your Stuff
•Zebunisso Alimova
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Want lenders to take you seriously as a first-home buyer? We break down the three levers that turn a shaky maybe into a confident yes: stable income, a targeted deposit plan, and clean account conduct. James joins me to unpack exactly what banks look for, how to structure your money, and what to fix first so your application lands on top of the pile.
We start with income because predictability wins. If you’re employed, being out of probation and three-plus months in your role often removes the biggest hurdle. Self-employed? A solid year of financial statements can get you across the line. We talk through what counts as income, why salaried roles carry more weight than benefits, and how lenders shade variable pay so you know what “borrowing power” really means.
Then we get practical about deposits. You can often begin from 5 percent, especially in regions with more accessible price points. KiwiSaver is your engine here—employer top-ups add momentum you can’t match on your own. Still, we draw a hard line for a separate cash buffer, ideally $5,000, to cover valuation, building inspection, solicitor fees, and those unplanned costs that pop up right before settlement. We also flag where bank cashbacks help and when second-tier lenders won’t offer them.
Finally, we read your statements like a credit assessor would. Defaults, old utility bills, random cash withdrawals, and gambling spend can derail a good file fast. We outline how to clean your credit report, clear small debts that make big waves, and build patterns that signal reliability. Think of us like a mortgage personal trainer: we set the plan, keep you accountable, and help you hit each milestone—so when the right home shows up, your finance stands up.
Ready to get mortgage-ready? Follow the show, share this with a friend saving for their first place, and leave a review telling us which step you’ll tackle first.
Hello, if you are a first home buyer, please listen up. This is an episode for you. I've got James with me, and he's gonna tell us all about first home buyers and how to be the credible
one. Hello, James. Aloha. I love that. Awesome. James, you've come up with this awesome topic, and I love the word credible. Let's dive into that.
SPEAKER_01
I've drank a lot of coffee just now, so I'm gonna have trouble pronouncing my words, but credible first home buyers? Absolutely. So what we're trying to do is create an idea of what you need to do to for the banks to or lenders to look at you seriously as a first-home buyer. So what are those key areas of your financial life that are gonna make you look have a strong application?
SPEAKER_00
Mm-hmm. Awesome.
SPEAKER_01
Go ahead. Okay, so firstly, you're gonna want I would say to have reasonably consistent incomes. Uh it doesn't have to they don't have to be big incomes,
but they I think they need to be consistent sort of incomes and you need to have been in your job for say three months plus at least, and not be on a probation type contract.
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01
If that makes sense. That changes a little bit, obviously, if you're working for yourself. So you you might need a year, you know, we we could probably get away with a year's worth of financial statements.
SPEAKER_00
Yep.
SPEAKER_01
If you're working for yourself. So so income is really important.
SPEAKER_00
So number one is income. Solid, permanent, ideally, yeah, stable income for over three months, so you're outside of that probation period, and then the lenders look at you more seriously. Awesome.
SPEAKER_01
And we're and when we say that, you know, the lenders do look at ACC income, they do look at other benefits and stuff like that. But obviously, it's much better if you have that stable income from a a salaried role. That's that's that's really gonna be a key point. Yeah, I think. Awesome. Cool. Cool, okay. So then the next thing is your deposit.
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01
So we can help people pretty much with anything from a 5% deposit
to, you know, over 20% deposit. So if you're looking at a $500,000 house, you know, that's only $25,000. So $500,000 house and you could probably get that in the wire wrapper in that sort of area, uh quite easily. Some areas outside Manuatu or even, you know, Wanganui really easily. Mm-hmm. But to give you an idea, 5% deposit.
SPEAKER_00
And if you've got two solid incomes, you should be able to save that within three to six months. Yeah. Really. Like if you really put your heart, mind to it, I know it's doable. I've seen it done before by other clients and by myself personally. If you've got two good incomes and if you can just cut out all the frills of life, you can save that five percent quite fast.
SPEAKER_01
Absolutely. So, and obviously, you you know, if you can get more than that, that would be great. But uh, that's the the the lowest bar is that deposit of five percent. So having that deposit and that deposit can be cash savings or it can be Kiwi Saver. So if you're starting out now as a young person, just start putting as much money as you can into Kiwi Saver from now because it's a great way to accumulate money without you actually saving anything. So that's the two main things.
SPEAKER_00
And the good thing about KiwiSaver as well is that as well as your deposit from the key from your pay, your employer also tops it up. So it's instant pay rise if you are in KiwiSaver.
SPEAKER_01
Yep. And you can do both, so you can maximize as much as you want into the into the Kiwi Saver, and then uh you get the contributions from your employee, but also you make sure that you're also putting some cash away in a different fund for yourself. Because that this is often what happens, isn't it? Like they have the the KiwiSaver fund and then they go to buy the house, but then they've got no there's no emergency money. So they've got no money for the valuation, they've got no money for the building inspection, lawyer fees, or any of those other things that come out. And it's it it's more stressful.
SPEAKER_00
I usually say to them, look, at least have five grand, five thousand dollars to help you cover those professional costs. And usually we will get them cash back if they're first-time buyers, but we'll get them five thousand dollars upon settlement, usually, yeah, if they go with the normal banks. Doesn't apply to second-tier lenders, but if they've gone with main bank or you know, small banks like SBS Cooperative Unity, they usually offer you five thousand dollars. Yeah, so you can recoup that money back, but do have a little bit to start with.
SPEAKER_01
Absolutely. So, and then there's the third thing, which uh which is a really important aspect as well, is and that is just having your affairs in
order so that you've got all your debt, outstanding debt is paid, you've got no defaults, you've got no outstand outstanding fines and all that sort of thing. You you want to make sure that you're you are working on improving how your financial records look. You know, so uh your credit score, you want to have a look at that and see and just make sure that you haven't not paid somebody from two years ago, say a a Power Bill or a Sky bill or anything like that that's outstanding. That needs to be sorted. And that's a really key aspect, it's just having a good, guess we'd say, account conduct. And that's what we can help you with.
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01
Because we can look at your stuff, we can look at your records and we go, this is what you need to sort out really quickly if you want to even be considering looking at a mortgage in three months' time. So that account conduct doesn't have to be perfect, but you need to be working on improving it. But you certainly have to have cleared any defaults, that sort of stuff. Yeah. That's a real no-no. And you know, that includes things like not spending excessive amounts on gambling and and things that would be called um I don't know what the lenders would call them, but they don't like gambling at all.
SPEAKER_00
But also random cash withdrawals. Yep. They don't like that either. So for those that are thinking I'll outsmart the bank and I'll just, you know, take out cash ATM withdrawals, the bank actually will be more curious because they want to know what you're doing with that cash.
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01
Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00
Awesome. Anything else to add?
SPEAKER_01
No, just yeah, just to summarize, those three things are what make a, I think, make a really credible first-time buyer. If you're you know, you might have the first two things and you might be close to the third one, which is having the really
good account conduct, but we can help you with that.
SPEAKER_00
So, you know, give it a And and I think that's the key, right? Like you need someone to tell you what you're doing right or wrong. Like with PT, if I want to lose weight, I want to go and speak to a professional in the gym and hopefully they can come up with a plan for me of what I need to do. Same story here. If you want to buy a house, come speak to us and then we can show you the way of what you need to do in order to get there.
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, exactly. That's a great analogy because uh, you know, a personal trainer, if you have a personal trainer, you get the personal trainer because that's the only way you can damn well do it to get fit or lose lose the weight. And it's the same with having somebody like that, like us. If you're if you're struggling a little bit to get to where you want to be, you need somebody to talk to and just it's it's almost like an accountability partner.
SPEAKER_00
You know, when you've got someone to be held accountable to, you tend to do things ten times more than otherwise. Awesome, James. Thank you so much, and see you soon.
