Brisbane-based lender targets top-tier self-employed borrowers in a segment led by prominent incumbents
Firstmac has launched its first alt-doc home loan, putting the Brisbane-based lender in direct competition with Pepper Money, Bluestone, Resimac and other established non-banks that have long been operating in the space
The product, which went live on Thursday, is open to borrowers who have been self-employed for at least two years, who can verify their income with six months of lodged Australian Taxation Office (ATO) Business Activity Statements (BAS). Rates start at 6.99% for an owner-occupied principal and interest (P&I) loan at a 70% loan-to-value ratio (LVR).
The loans will be funded through Firstmac’s Eagle residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS) program, separate from the Benchmark program that funds its prime book.
A segment with entrenched incumbents
Firstmac is entering the market well behind the incumbents. At Pepper Money, around a third of customers use alt-doc options, and alt-doc is also a core part of Resimac’s home loan range.
Competition is already squeezing margins; lenders interviewed by MPA said the gap between bank and alt-doc pricing has narrowed substantially. ORDE Financial, Liberty, Thinktank and Brighten are also prominent in the alt-doc space.
Firstmac’s strategy is to take the top end of that market rather than compete across all of it. It argues that self-employed borrowers with strong credit are often paying more than their risk warrants.
“These customers can find themselves paying substantially-higher interest rates,” Firstmac chief commercial officer Marie Mortimer said. “We’re not looking to compete across the entire alt-doc market. We’re specifically targeting the premium end, where borrowers have strong credit credentials but don’t quite meet traditional documentation requirements.”
Asked how Firstmac intends to win share from lenders already established in the alt-doc segment, Mortimer stressed that the target market is intentionally narrow. “By keeping it quite narrow and having quite a simple assessment process, we can service our brokers better through our systems, which are very automated.”
Firstmac already sees self-employed borrowers through its self-employed pay-as-you-go (PAYG) product, but broker feedback helped shape the alt-doc launch. And Mortimer did not rule out moving further into alt-doc. “We’ll never say never, but for now we think that there’s a good market with just this segment of it.”
Prime lending slowdown
The launch comes as prime lending cools and policy changes cut off a growth area for non-banks. Since 10 August 2026, self-managed super funds (SMSFs) can no longer borrow to buy residential property. Firstmac was among eight non-bank lenders that publicly opposed the change.
“We saw the SMSF surge, but coming off that this month, we can see that the market is a bit slower,” Mortimer said. “And that’s nothing new – the majors are seeing that, other non-banks are seeing that.”
While Firstmac is known as a traditionally conservative lender compared to its non-bank contemporaries, the changes have forced a rethink. “I think with some of these government changes, particularly around investment lending and SMSF, we’ve had to do a strategy review, like I think all non-bank lenders have recently.”
As part of that review, Firstmac has also redesigned its bridging loans.
