This week in banking news - December RBA meeting, Judo Bank, home loans and Christmas

• Will the Reserve Bank of Australia cut the official cash rate again in December?
• How Judo Bank is standing out from the crowd.
• How the Australian housing market has changed in the past five years.
• Easing expenses over the Christmas season.

All in this week’s banking recap.

Will the RBA cut the official cash rate again in December?

With the Reserve Bank of Australia’s monthly meeting coming up next week, the question on everyone’s mind is, will there be another cut? Following cuts in June, July and October this year, the official cash rate now stands at a record low 0.75%. 

At the moment, the general consensus from the experts is that the RBA will hold off on cutting this time around and that the next cut will most probably be February 2020. 

As Mozo’s banking expert Peter Marshall suggested, if the official cash rate is cut early next year, the effect on interest rates will most probably be similar to what it was after previous cuts. Some banks will see fit to pass on the full cut while others will only pass on a portion of it.

Judo Bank stands out from the crowd with new term deposit rate

Speaking of interest rates, challenger bank Judo revealed changes to its term deposit rates this Monday. The most significant of which was a 0.25% increase to its five year term deposit, bringing the total interest rate up to 2.50%.

In fact, Judo Bank’s five year term deposit now has the highest interest rate in the Mozo database, for this type of term, standing 0.80% above the second highest five year term deposit rate.

How the Australian property market has changed since 2014

In other news, we took a look at how the Australian property market has changed in the past five years.

According to CoreLogic’s Mapping the Market survey, released in September this year, house prices have increased in most Australian cities since 2014. The number of suburbs with a median house value under $500,000 has generally decreased quite dramatically and the portion of suburbs with a median house value of $1 million has increased.

However, with that interest rates have also decreased following the RBA cuts, so now is not necessarily the worst time to be taking out a home loan.

How to cover the costs of Christmas in 2019

Christmas can be a magical time of year, but it can also be a pretty pricey time of year too. As Mozo Director, Kirsty Lamont suggested, money can rapidly disappear during the festive season on things such as gifts, food and social events.

It’s a time of year when many Aussies may be thinking about taking out a credit card to ease the financial pressure. Of course, if you are one of many thinking of other ways to pay for your purchases, one thing to keep in mind is that there are plenty of credit cards out there.

In fact, at the moment there are a number of credit cards on offer with 0% purchase rate offers, meaning you could avoid paying interest on purchases for a certain period of time.

If you think this type of credit card could help you out this festive season, why not take a look at the offers below, to see which one might suit you best.