Paying the mortgage is increasingly coming at the expense of basic healthcare, with new research showing nearly one in two Australians have delayed medical treatment because of home loan costs.
Fresh Money.com.au data cited by realestate.com.au reveals borrowers are postponing everything from dental work to mental health care as they prioritise keeping up with repayments.
Among those who delayed care, 61% skipped dental appointments, 23% put off specialist visits, 12% deferred mental health treatment and 4% delayed surgery or other procedures.
Money.com.au mortgage expert Debbie Hays (pictured) says rising home loan costs are forcing a difficult trade-off between “essential bills and essential care”, with many clients raiding offsets or redraw to cover procedures.
Australians are already spending an average of $4,059 per person each year on healthcare, leaving less room to absorb higher repayments.
Hays notes that “more borrowers (50%) are tapping into their offset or redraw accounts to pay for medical expenses or elective surgery when they need it sooner than the public system allows,” and that in many cases they are topping up their home loans for larger procedures. She warns “it means people are effectively putting healthcare on their mortgage and paying interest on it over time.”
Separate Roy Morgan analysis shows mortgage stress rising off recent lows, with 24.9% of home loan customers – around 1.32 million borrowers – classified as ‘at risk’ of mortgage stress in the three months to February 2026, up one percentage point from January after the latest rate hike. The research notes that the share of borrowers at risk would jump further if the cash rate moves higher again, reversing much of the improvement seen through 2025.
The Reserve Bank reinforced that pressure at its March meeting, lifting the cash rate by 25 basis points to 4.1% and citing “ongoing inflationary pressures” linked to capacity constraints and sharply higher fuel prices from the Middle East conflict. The board voted 5–4 in favour of the move, signalling a narrow but decisive call to tighten policy.
Westpac has since revised its outlook, adding two extra hikes to its 2026 profile and now tipping the cash rate to peak at 4.85%, the highest level since the global financial crisis. Chief economist Luci Ellis says the bank expects RBA to “tighten monetary policy by more than would have been needed absent” the rapid pass‑through from higher fuel prices into broader inflation.
For brokers, the combination of rising mortgage stress, clients deferring healthcare, and the prospect of further cash rate increases underlines the importance of testing repayment resilience, revisiting fixed‑rate and split‑loan strategies, and proactively checking in with vulnerable borrowers before short‑term cutbacks harden into long‑term financial and health risks.
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