How hard will it be to buy a house on a 457 visa?

We're just doing it right now. First thing is to find the house you want and then apply to the Foreign Investment Review Board (FIRB: www.firb.gov.au) for approval, as a foreigner, to buy Australian property (altho you can get clearance to bid in auctions without knowing exactly which property you want). This is pretty much automatic in regular cases, although they take anything between 1 and 30 days to approve.

Next step is to get unconditional approval from the bank for a home loan. Ideally, and depending on how much time you want it all to take, you need to start the home loan application process as soon as you know how much you want to borrorw, too. Once you get FIRB approval, you can tell the bank and, hopefully, get approval for the loan.

It helps if you have money for a substantial deposit - most, but not all, banks will only lend up to 80% of the purchase price to someone on a 457 - and the backing of the company you're working for, if you're on a sub-3 yr contract, so they know you're not going to do a runner.

It's really easy to buy on a 457 just a matter of FIRB approval and then basically the same as everyone else. As above we needed a 20% deposit, but had no trouble getting a mortgage (hubby had been working for 3 months when we applied)

Tracey

Thanks for the replies.

I wonder if it will make any difference to the banks that we will be in the process of applying for a 136MODL visa? I guess they'll still want 20% deposit.

It wont make any difference to them, they and firb can only take into account the type of visa you actually hold, but different lenders do offer different deposit options.

Lynn

The only problem with buying on a 457 visa is that you dont qualify for the
first home owners grant

If we are moving to WA, is there any restriction on the age of the property (i.e. will it have to be a new one?)

Debs

Not if you are usng it as your main place of residence, if you intend to rent it out it will have to be new.

Lynn

if you buy a house on 457 you can apply for the $7k first home grant up to 12 months after you purchase the house if you apply and get your PR during that 12 months.

100% true.
Every State is different but that is the case also for QLD.
Bought our house on a 457.
12 months and one day later, we acheived PR and managed to get our FHOG. I really thought we were stuffed and couldn't beleive they allowed us to be 1 day out!

Andrew

If you are not a PR and only on a temporary visa then you will have to put down a minimum deposit of 20%. This is not the banks requirement but the Lender Mortgage Insurance. Any property where the deposit is less than 20% needs to have Lenders Mortage Insurance. To get LMI you need to be a PR.

If you are looking to sort your home loan out and would like me to contact you to show you what your options are then send me a private message and I will give you a call. I am a mortgage broker (MIAA member) so have access to a majority of the lenders and products.

Sharon