A Moneybren tool
NZ BORROWING POWER CALCULATOR
How much can you actually borrow in New Zealand under the Reserve Bank’s DTI and deposit rules — and what’s really holding you back, your income or your deposit?
Your numbers
$/yr
Before tax, all borrowers combined.
$
Car loans, personal loans, and credit card limits (banks count the limit, not the balance).
$
% pa
Banks stress-test your servicing at a rate well above today’s — usually 7–9%.
You could buy up to about
$0
Where the limit comes from
Flip it: the house you want
$
The rules behind this. Since 1 July 2024 the Reserve Bank caps most lending at a debt-to-income ratio of 6× gross income for owner-occupiers and 7× for investors (total debt, including your existing loans and credit card limits). LVR rules separately require roughly a 20% deposit for owner-occupiers and 30% for investors. Banks can exceed the DTI cap for a small share of lending, and their own servicing tests — run at inflated test rates against your actual spending — are usually the tighter constraint. Treat this as the ceiling, not a pre-approval; a broker can tell you where you’d actually land.
How to use this calculator
Enter your household income, existing debts, deposit, and buyer type. The calculator applies the RBNZ’s DTI cap and deposit rules, shows which one limits you, and sanity-checks the repayments at a stress-test rate.
Then flip it: enter the price of the house you actually want, and see the income and deposit it demands.
This is a tool only, and none of the information it produces is financial advice. Its accuracy is not guaranteed. Always check your own figures and get advice from your own financial professionals before making decisions.