Three more banks join the rate-cut party

Despite the Reserve Bank of Australia holding off a rate adjustment this month, more lenders are joining the rate-cut bandwagon, with Bankwest, ME Bank, and UBank being the latest to make their move to keep up with their bigger rivals.

ME Bank and NAB-owned UBank both repriced their owner-occupier and investor home loans — the former slashed its variable and fixed interest rates by up to 26 basis points while the latter announced up to 30 basis-point rate reduction, according to a report in 10 Daily.

The most significant rate reductions from both lenders are for investor borrowers. ME Bank's two-year fixed-rate principal-and-interest (P&I) investor home loan now bears a new rate of 3.88% while UBank's five-year fixed-rate interest-only (I&O) investor home loan incurs a reduced rate of 4.39%

The table below shows the changes in ME Bank and UBank's mortgage rates for owner-occupier and investor home loans.

Perth-based Bankwest, a lender owned by Commonwealth Bank, also trimmed its fixed rates by up to 50 basis points, an AAP report said.

Its three-year owner-occupier principal-and-interest home loan now has a reduced mortgage rate of 3.48%, which, according to AAP, is the lowest in the market.

Bankwest also lowered the interest rate of its three-year investor home loan to 3.88%.