Brokers now write 81 per cent of new home loans, a record share

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Kooky

Builder of Shaka, the payment router that pays every agent their commission on closing date.

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Four out of every five new home loans in Australia are now arranged by a mortgage broker. The Mortgage and Finance Association of Australia (MFAA) put the broker share of new residential lending at 81 per cent for the March quarter of 2026, the highest since its series began more than a decade ago, in figures reported by The Adviser on Wednesday 10 June 2026.

The figure is national and the MFAA's summary does not break it down by state. It matters in Queensland all the same, because it describes how most buyers here now meet their lender: through a third party, with the bank itself several steps away. It also frames a local oddity. One of the two large banking brands headquartered in Brisbane has stepped back from the broker channel just as that channel has become the main road to a home loan.

MFAA quarterly market share figures for the March quarter 2026, compiled by Cotality from aggregator settlement data, as reported by The Adviser on 10 June 2026.

What the figures show

The MFAA's quarterly series is built from settlement data supplied by the large aggregators, the wholesale groups that sit between brokers and lenders, and is compiled by the research firm Cotality. It counts loans that actually settled, not applications.

On that measure brokers settled $124.88 billion of home loans between January and March 2026. That is $25.51 billion more than in the same three months of 2025, which puts the March quarter 2025 figure at $99.37 billion and the increase at about 26 per cent.

The share has climbed in every recent comparison. It was 76.8 per cent in the March quarter of 2025 and 74.1 per cent in the March quarter of 2024, so the latest figure is 4.2 percentage points higher than a year earlier and 6.9 points higher than two years earlier. One quarter before, in the December quarter of 2025, it was 76.7 per cent.

The longer view is the striking one. In the March quarter of 2018 the share was 55.3 per cent. In eight years the channel has gained 25.7 percentage points, moving from a little over half the market to four fifths of it.

Why borrowers are choosing a broker

Anja Pannek, the MFAA's chief executive, is reported by The Adviser as saying the figures confirm that using a broker has become the norm rather than the exception. She linked the rise to borrowers working through affordability and cost-of-living pressures.

The period the figures cover supports that reading. The March quarter of 2026 included two of this year's three increases in the cash rate, in February and March. Each increase reduces the amount a lender will approve for a given income, because lenders test repayments at a rate 3 percentage points above the one they charge. When a household's borrowing limit is tight, the differences between lenders' policies matter more: how each one treats overtime, rental income, a second job or an existing car loan can decide whether an application succeeds.

A borrower who walks into one bank hears one bank's answer. A broker with a panel of lenders can test the same household against several sets of rules. That is the practical service the channel sells in a market where rates are rising, and it helps explain why the share jumped more in the past year than in the year before.

How a broker is paid and what the law requires

A reader meeting a broker for the first time should know two things, both set out by Moneysmart, the consumer site run by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission.

The first is the duty. A mortgage broker is required to act in the borrower's best interests when suggesting a loan. Moneysmart describes the broker's job as understanding the borrower's needs, working out what they can afford to borrow, finding options that suit, explaining how each loan works and what it costs, and managing the application through to settlement.

The second is the money. Moneysmart explains that lenders usually pay the broker a commission, which is a percentage of the loan amount and typically has an upfront part and an ongoing part. Some brokers also charge the borrower a fee, which must be set out in a written quote and signed before the service is provided. The borrower is entitled to ask what commission the broker will receive on each loan suggested.

Moneysmart lists questions worth putting to any broker: whether they offer loans from a range of lenders, what kinds of lender they work with, and which lenders they cannot access. A broker must hold a credit licence or be the representative of a licence holder, and either can be checked on the regulator's professional register.

Where Queensland's banks sit

The last question matters more in Queensland than in most places, because of where two local institutions stand.

Bank of Queensland has paused new home lending through brokers under its main brand, The Adviser reported on 2 June in its coverage of APRA's monthly banking statistics, while continuing to write broker loans through its subsidiaries BOQ Specialist and ME Bank. A Queensland borrower who wants a loan from the BOQ brand itself therefore has to go to the bank, not to a broker.

Suncorp Bank is in a different position. It is now owned by ANZ and, according to the same report, is scheduled to be integrated into ANZ by 30 June 2027.

The numbers suggest what stepping away from a channel carrying four fifths of new loans can mean. The Adviser's analysis of the APRA figures for April 2026 showed BOQ's home loan book slipping 0.19 per cent in the month to $52.4 billion and Suncorp Bank's falling 0.65 per cent to $57.3 billion. Over the same month Macquarie Bank grew its book by 2.03 per cent to $177.2 billion. Many things move a loan book, including pricing and appetite for growth, and one month does not make a trend. The contrast is still a fair illustration of where new lending is flowing.

For a borrower the lesson is modest. A comparison prepared by a broker covers the lenders on that broker's panel, and a Queenslander who wants a particular local bank in the comparison should ask whether it is there.

What a broker can and cannot change

A broker chooses among lenders; a broker does not change the rules those lenders work under. Every bank regulated by the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority must test a borrower's repayments at a rate at least 3 percentage points above the loan's actual rate, a setting APRA confirmed on 28 May 2026 that it was keeping. No panel, however wide, contains a bank that can skip that test.

What differs from lender to lender is everything around it: which income counts in full, how living expenses are estimated, how an existing credit card limit is treated, and how far the bank is prepared to lend against a particular kind of property. Those differences are where a broker's knowledge earns its place, and they are also why two honest answers to the same household can be tens of thousands of dollars apart.

If the service goes wrong, Moneysmart sets out the order of steps. A borrower raises the problem with the broker first, then makes a formal written complaint to the broker's business, and if that does not settle it, takes the matter to the Australian Financial Complaints Authority, which resolves disputes independently and at no cost to the consumer.

What it means for buyers and what comes next

For a Queensland buyer the record share changes little on the day, and is useful mainly as a map. Most loans now come through brokers; a broker has a legal duty to the borrower; the broker is paid by the lender; and the panel a broker draws on leaves out some names that a Queenslander might expect to see, including the main BOQ brand.

For lenders the trend raises the cost of staying outside the channel and the cost of staying inside it. A bank that relies on brokers pays commission on four loans in five. A bank that does not must find its borrowers another way.

For brokers the figure brings attention as well as business. A channel that arranges four fifths of new home loans is the place where lending standards are met or missed first, and regulators and lenders both watch the quality of applications that arrive through it.

The MFAA publishes its market share figures each quarter. The next set will cover the June quarter of 2026, the first full quarter after the May increase in the cash rate and the federal Budget's changes to property tax, and will show whether a slower market changes the share or only the volume behind it.

Kooky, from Shaka

Kooky edits Queensland Estate and builds Shaka, the payment router he made for Queensland property professionals. One payment comes in, and every agent, agency and party in the deal receives their signed share on closing date.

About Kooky and Shaka →