Second mortgage business loans
A second mortgage business loan lets you borrow against property equity without touching your existing home or commercial loan. HomeSec registers behind your current lender, from $20,000 to $5,000,000, to a combined LVR of 80% on residential security or 70% on commercial, typically settling in 24 to 72 hours. Your first mortgage rate, term and structure stay exactly as they are.
See if you qualify in sixty seconds. No credit check to apply, no financials, no payments for the first six months. That's the HomeSec Advantage.
See if you qualifyWhy not just refinance?
Because refinancing to release $300,000 can cost you the rate on $900,000. If your first mortgage was written when money was cheaper, or it is a fixed loan with break costs, or your current financials will not support a new full-doc application, refinancing is the expensive way to solve a contained problem. A second mortgage leaves the good loan alone and prices only the money you actually need.
It is also faster. A bank refinance is a three-to-eight week process with a full credit assessment. A second mortgage behind it is a title search, a consent where required, and a set of documents.
What is the first mortgagee's role?
For a registered second mortgage, your existing lender is generally asked to consent, and a priority deed sets out how the two loans rank against each other on a sale. Most Australian banks and non-banks handle these routinely. Turnaround varies by lender, and it is the single most common reason a second mortgage takes 72 hours rather than 24.
Where the deadline will not wait for consent, a caveat is often the better instrument — it needs nobody's agreement. We will tell you which one your file suits on the first call, and we do not charge differently for the advice.
How much can I release?
Combined LVR to 80% on residential security, 70% on commercial. In practice: take the property's value, multiply by the applicable ceiling, subtract what is owed on the first mortgage, and the balance is roughly what is available.
| Security | Value | 1st mortgage | Ceiling | Available |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Residential | $780,000 | $410,000 | 80% — $624,000 | $214,000 |
| Residential | $1,250,000 | $690,000 | 80% — $1,000,000 | $310,000 |
| Residential | $2,400,000 | $1,100,000 | 80% — $1,920,000 | $820,000 |
| Residential | $4,000,000 | $1,450,000 | 80% — $3,200,000 | $1,750,000 |
| Commercial | $3,000,000 | $900,000 | 70% — $2,100,000 | $1,200,000 |
Indicative only. Value is assessed on our own view of the security, not a formal valuation.
What second mortgages are used for
- Working capital without touching the home loan
- The most common file: a good bank loan on the house, a business that needs $150,000 for a season, and no appetite for refinancing a $700,000 facility to get it.
- The ATO, paid direct from settlement
- A tax debt cleared in one payment behind the bank, with no repayments while the business recovers the ground.
- A deposit on premises or a site
- Equity in the home becomes the deposit; the purchase itself is financed separately, or by us in first position over the new property.
- Consolidating expensive facilities
- Daily-debit loans and called facilities paid out behind the bank, at a lower cost and with the cash effect during the term reduced to nothing.
- Bridging to a sale of another property
- The investment unit is under contract; the money is needed before it settles. A second mortgage over the home bridges, repaid from the proceeds.
Second mortgage, caveat or first — which one is your file?
| Second mortgage | Caveat | First mortgage | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Your existing home loan | Untouched — rate, term and structure stay | Untouched | Paid out and replaced |
| Consent required | Usually the first mortgagee's | Nobody's | Nobody's |
| Typical settlement | 24 – 72 hours | As little as 24 hours | As little as 24 hours |
| Cost tier over the same property | Middle | Highest | Lowest |
| Use it when | The bank loan is good and you need the difference | The date will not wait for consent | The property is unencumbered, or the existing loan is small or expensive |
HomeSec's own three instruments compared over the same property. "Cost tier" ranks them against each other; it is not a rate, and none is published.
What happens if the first mortgage goes into default
This is the part almost nobody explains, and it is the strongest practical argument for a registered second mortgage over an informal arrangement. A first mortgagee cannot simply sell. Before it can exercise a power of sale it has to serve a default notice, and the Torrens legislation requires that notice to reach the people the Register says are affected — which, once a second mortgage is registered behind your bank, includes the second mortgagee.
| The notice goes to the second lender too, not only to you | In New South Wales, section 57(2)(b1) of the Real Property Act 1900 requires a copy of the default notice to be served on every registered mortgagee of lower priority — and also on a caveator claiming as an unregistered mortgagee. In Victoria, section 76(1) of the Transfer of Land Act 1958 requires notice to the mortgagor "and such other persons as appear by the Register to be affected". A lender properly recorded on the title learns of the default early, rather than at the auction. |
|---|---|
| The clock is one month unless the mortgage fixes longer | Section 57(3)(d) requires the notice to allow one month from service — or a longer period where the mortgage sets one — before a power of sale is proposed. Victoria's section 76(1) uses the same one month "or such other period as is therein expressly fixed". That month is the whole window, and it is shorter than most people assume when the envelope arrives. |
| Curing the default inside the month undoes it | Section 57(4) is explicit: where the requirements of the notice are complied with in time, "the default to which the notice relates shall be deemed not to have occurred". Not waived, not noted — deemed not to have happened. For a business with real equity and a timing problem rather than a solvency one, that sentence is the reason speed is worth paying for. |
| The whole balance does not fall due the day you miss a payment | Acceleration clauses are standard in mortgage documents, but section 57(5) provides that a covenant making the whole of the principal payable on default "has no force or effect" until the power of sale actually becomes exercisable. The loan is not legally called in on day one, whatever the letter reads like. |
Those are the New South Wales and Victorian provisions; the other states run their own versions on their own timetables, so check the Act for the state your title is in before planning around a date. This describes land titles procedure in general terms and is not legal advice. None of it is an argument for letting a first mortgage reach that point — the time to make the call is when you can see the month coming, not after it has started.
From the call to the money
Tell us the deal
Amount, purpose, timing, the property and how the loan gets repaid. A Lending Manager gives you an indicative answer on that call — usually in minutes.
Minutes
Conditional approval
Photo ID, a rates notice and your most recent mortgage statement. That is the whole list, and it takes about fifteen minutes.
About 15 minutes
Funds released
As little as 24 hours from a clean, complete scenario. Paid where you tell us — to your account, or straight to the ATO.
As little as 24 hours
On a second mortgage the third step runs 24 – 72 hours, and the difference is the first mortgagee's consent. The first lender's verbal consent takes a day or two. Why that makes it the fast instrument over a property that already has a loan, in Paul Stone's words and on video, is on the fast second mortgage page.
The term is open
We do not fix it. There is no minimum, no maximum, no penalty for repaying early and no fee for extending — because we fund our own loans with our own money and have no fund mandate requiring capital back on a date. If your exit moves, we move with it, and it takes a phone call. Why an open term matters more than the rate.
What it costs, and the honest limitation
Second mortgage money in the Australian private market generally sits well above bank pricing — this is higher-risk lending and it is priced that way. We do not publish a headline rate, because private lending is risk-priced per file and any single number would be a best case or a bait. Here is how it is actually priced, and every fee that exists.
The limitation worth stating plainly: this product solves a timing problem, not a solvency problem. If the business is losing money structurally, borrowing at second-mortgage rates against the family home makes the eventual outcome worse, not better. We decline files on that basis regularly, and we would rather tell you in the first ten minutes.
Questions we get on the phone
Will my bank find out?
Does my first mortgage rate change?
How long can I keep it?
Do second mortgage lenders require a valuation?
Second mortgage or caveat — which is better?
Can the second mortgage be in my company's name?
Can I make repayments during the term if I want to?
What happens at the end?
Is it hard to qualify for a second mortgage?
Is a second mortgage a good idea?
What if my credit file is not clean?
Not a call centre. Tell us the amount, the purpose and what property is available, and we will tell you which instrument fits and what it costs. 1300 93 83 87, Mon–Fri, 8:30am – 5:30pm Melbourne time.
These describe the same money from different angles. If the one you are on is not the shape you need, one of these will be.
See if you qualify in sixty seconds
Three short questions, no credit check to apply and no financial statements. A Lending Manager reads it and calls you back with a real answer — not a call centre, not an algorithm.
That's the HomeSec Advantage.
Reviewed by Jason Brockmuller, Joint Chief Executive