What you need for a $900,000 home in Australia

Looking to buy a home for around $900,000? In today’s market, a home at this price point can be found in many areas of regional Australia as well as towards the outskirts of our major cities, while you can buy a unit for around $900,000 in our capitals.

Let’s look at how much deposit you’ll need to buy a property at this price level, and how much income you’ll need to comfortably manage your monthly repayments.

Your first step before buying a home is to save up for a deposit. A typical home loan deposit is 20% of the property’s purchase price, which gives you a loan-to-value ratio (LVR) of 80%. In some circumstances, your home loan deposit can be as little as 5-10%.

If you want to buy a home for $900,000, a 20% deposit will amount to $180,000. The benefit of saving up for a 20% deposit is that you’ll usually get access to better rates than you would with a smaller deposit, though this can be increasingly difficult amid rising property prices.

• 20% deposit – $180,000
• 10% deposit – $90,000
• 5% deposit – $45,000

Some lenders will approve you for a home loan with a 5-10% deposit, but you may need to pay lenders mortgage insurance (LMI) which could increase the overall cost of your mortgage in the long run. 

On top of this, smaller deposits often expose you to higher interest rates due to your elevated LVR. No matter the size of your deposit, it’s important to compare home loans to make sure you’re getting a low rate – it could save you thousands over the life of your loan.

If you’re short of a 20% deposit, here are some strategies to avoid paying LMI and getting stung with higher interest rates:

• Ask someone to go guarantor on the home loan
• Use a cash gift as part of (or all of) your deposit
• Check your eligibility for a first home owner grant

There are other costs you might need to cover when you take out a home loan, such as upfront fees and government charges. Here are some extra costs you might need to pay:

• Application fees
• Settlement fees
• Conveyancing fees
• Property valuation fees
• Stamp duty (if applicable)

These fees can add up to hundreds or even thousands of dollars, so factor them into your overall costs.

Remember that you may be eligible for exemption from some additional costs through government grants and home buying schemes. For example, you could avoid paying for stamp duty through a first home buyer scheme.

If you buy a $900,000 home with a 20% deposit, you’ll need to take out a $720,000 loan. For this example, let’s say you’re an owner-occupier paying principal and interest, and your loan term is 25 years. We’ll assume you have the average variable interest rate of 6.02% p.a.† (as at 25 August, 2025).

Using our mortgage repayment calculator, we can work out the monthly repayment on a $720,000 home loan is $4,648.

Once you have an idea of your monthly repayment, you can work out how much you need to earn to comfortably manage your repayments – use our borrowing power calculator to get started.

It’s generally understood that borrowers are under mortgage stress when more than 30% of their pre-tax income is going towards their home loan. That means you’d need to earn at least $15,493 pre-tax each month to manage a $720,000 mortgage without strain.

Over a year, you’d need a pre-tax income of approximately $185,920, or if you’re a dual income household, two people would each need to be earning $92,960 every year.

† Source: Mozo database on 25 August, 2025. Average home loan variable interest rate for owner occupiers with a 20% deposit (80% LVR), making principal and interest repayments on a $500,000 loan over 25 years.

Don’t be disheartened if you don’t meet these benchmarks – lenders take several factors into account when deciding how much money you can borrow. In addition to how much you earn, banks and lenders can also consider:

• Your expenses and spending habits
• Your existing debt (if any)
• Your savings over time
• Your job security

This process is assessing your home loan serviceability – determining your ability to pay off a mortgage over time. Banks can also add a 3% buffer to their interest rates to determine if you’ll still be able to afford your repayments in the face of rate hikes in the future.

Here’s a snapshot of median dwelling values in Australia’s capital cities, according to Cotality’s housing data for July 2025, to give you an idea of what you can buy with $900,000.

• Sydney: below the median home value ($1,228,435), so you would likely be looking at a unit in many areas or a house in outer suburbs.

• Melbourne: median value of $803,424 can offer good buying power in our second-largest city.

• Brisbane: a median value of $934,623 can still provide some solid options across many suburbs.

• Adelaide: solid buying power with a median value of $843,339.

• Perth: rate of housing value growth in Perth has been significant year-on-year, but the median value is still below $900,000 ($831,921).

• Hobart: median dwelling value sitting at $673,383.

• Darwin: very strong buying power in Darwin, with a median value of $549,371.

• Canberra: could be good options across the capital within budget, with a median value of $861,281.