Sep 7, 2026 · 1 hr · 12 segments
This week on The Gippsland Builder, we're talking about the side of building nobody gets excited about, until it stops your application dead. Trav and Josh sit down with Dan McNamara, mortgage…
Dan McNamaraGuestTravHostJoshHostSo someone who's going to start the building process, mate, why do we go to finance first?
Most people, where are they going to start the journey? We always want to talk and go, have you spoken about finance? But why is that an important piece? I
think one of the first questions a sales consultant from a builder is going to ask is, what's your budget? How do you know what your budget is if you don't know what you can afford and what your potential borrowing capacity is? So at such, you know, there's no point having a conversation with you guys about, yes, I can buy a house and land package for a million bucks if your borrowing capacity is 800.
I as a client walk into you guys and they go, hey, I've got a budget of $800,000.
So, you know, having that first conversation and getting an accurate idea of what that looks like is really, really important.
And I encourage clients to talk to their builder about exactly what their maximum borrowing capacity is not because the builder's then going to price a job at that amount but if they've got a little bit more wiggle room and they're wanting to increase uh some of the you know inclusions um you know by 20 000 is there capacity to do that or not so yeah the finance discussion should be something that's open between between all And it is
a really tough situation to be in.
Nobody wants to disclose.
They feel like they're going to get ripped off.
Like you said, hey, here's my budget.
Cool.
We know how much to charge for the house.
It's an extra couple of hundred thousand dollars.
But I think that the market, unfortunately, the builder market certainly dictates the deception piece, which is probably why people are very guarded.
So we like when people are talking to brokers because brokers give different information.
So I think there's a real value piece in that for sure, because knowing your budget up front just takes a lot of the
And I think one of the things is knowing the number, but that then leads on to, you know, what's your actual repayment? You know, how much can you afford to? And we'll go into that a bit later.
But knowing how much you're wanting to spend in a month, just because the bank's going to give you $800,000 doesn't mean you want to do that.
That's something I say a lot of the time.
So someone who's going to start the building process, mate, why do we go to finance first?
Most people, where are they going to start the journey? We always want to talk and go, have you spoken about finance? But why is that an important piece? I
think one of the first questions a sales consultant from a builder is going to ask is, what's your budget? How do you know what your budget is if you don't know what you can afford and what your potential borrowing capacity is? So at such, you know, there's no point having a conversation with you guys about, yes, I can buy a house and land package for a million bucks if your borrowing capacity is 800.
I as a client walk into you guys and they go, hey, I've got a budget of $800,000.
So, you know, having that first conversation and getting an accurate idea of what that looks like is really, really important.
And I encourage clients to talk to their builder about exactly what their maximum borrowing capacity is not because the builder's then going to price a job at that amount but if they've got a little bit more wiggle room and they're wanting to increase uh some of the you know inclusions um you know by 20 000 is there capacity to do that or not so yeah the finance discussion should be something that's open between between all And it is
a really tough situation to be in.
Nobody wants to disclose.
They feel like they're going to get ripped off.
Like you said, hey, here's my budget.
Cool.
We know how much to charge for the house.
It's an extra couple of hundred thousand dollars.
But I think that the market, unfortunately, the builder market certainly dictates the deception piece, which is probably why people are very guarded.
So we like when people are talking to brokers because brokers give different information.
So I think there's a real value piece in that for sure, because knowing your budget up front just takes a lot of the
And I think one of the things is knowing the number, but that then leads on to, you know, what's your actual repayment? You know, how much can you afford to? And we'll go into that a bit later.
But knowing how much you're wanting to spend in a month, just because the bank's going to give you $800,000 doesn't mean you want to do that.
That's something I say a lot of the time.
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