A quarter of new Westpac mortgages fixed as borrowers stump up 30% deposits: anatomy of its $321 billion home loan book

Nearly a quarter (24%) of Westpac customers fixed their home loan rate in the six months to March 31, the latest interim results reveal.

This was up from just 13% in the previous six month period.

The jump in fixed-rate demand came after Westpac cut its two year fixed-rate to 4.99% for a short period between February and March, the first major bank to offer a sub-5% fixed-rate since September 2009.

Lending to investors picked up to 45.6% and loans to first-home buyers fell marginally to 11.1%.

Borrowers stumped up a hefty 30% deposit on average for a Westpac mortgage.

1 Represents Westfield Retail Bank brands (WRBB) and St.George (including RAMS). 2 Flow is all new mortgage originations total settled amount originated during the 6 month period ended 31 March 2013 and includes RAMS. 3. Excludes RAMS. 4. Dynamic LVR represents the loan-to-value ratio taking into account the current outstanding loan balance, changes in security value and other loan adjustments. 5 Property valuation source Australian Property Monitors. 6. Average LVR of new loans is based on rolling 12 month window for each year end period. 7. Customer loans ahead on payments exclude equity/line of credit products as there are no scheduled principal payments. 8 Mortgage insurance claims 1H13 $10m (2H12 $17m and 1H12 $13m). 9 ABA Cannex August 2012