Home loans are offered with many different options and additional features which may or may not be cost saving and of benefit. Listing which features are important or optional will help you shortlist potential lenders and home loan types. Home Loan Types.

• Variable interest rate home loan
• Fixed interest rate home loan
• Line of Credit home loan
• Introductory rate home loan
• Reverse Mortgage

Income verification levels available for home loans are as follows.

• Full documentation loan
• Low documentation loan, low doc
• No documentation loan, no doc

The above home loan types are often further broken down into the following sub types.

• Standard variable interest rate home loan
• Basic variable interest rate home loan
• Professional Pack home loan fixed or variable interest rate
• Fixed interest rate home loan, 6 months, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, 12, 15, 20, 30 years fixed interest rate term

Common features which may often be added to these home loan types are as follows.

• Extended loan terms, 40 or 50 years
• Interest only repayments
• Split loans
• Transactional accounts
• Offset accounts
• Additional repayments
• Cheque Accounts
• EFTPOS cards
• Debit cards
• Credit cards
• Phone banking
• Internet banking
• Portability
• Overseas Borrowers resident or non resident
• Company borrowers
• Credit impaired borrowers
• Servicing guarantors
• Security guarantors
• Refinance
• Redraw
• Credit card auto sweep
• BPay
• Direct debit
• Owner builder
• Construction
• Bridging or relocation
• Repayment pause

Items to watch out for that may not be obvious up front when comparing a home loan are as follows.

• Deferred Establishment fees
• Early repayment fee or early repayment penalty
• Fixed interest rate break costs
• Additional repayment allowance or restrictions
• Switching fees
• Mortgage insurance cost
• Account keeping fees
• ATM and eftpos fees
• Application fees
• Loan discharge fees
• Lender legal fees
• Property valuation fees