Australian interest rates Australian Property

Mortgage stress surges with worse to come

Friday 2 October 2026

Roy Morgan’s latest mortgage stress survey shows that 32.3% of mortgage households were at risk of mortgage stress in August, with 22.7% extremely at risk:

Mortgage stress was tracking at its highest levels since the peak of the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) in mid-2008, when the official cash rate hit 7%.

The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) lifted the cash rate by 0.25% on Tuesday to 4.60%, and financial markets have priced in at least one and maybe two additional rate hikes:

The full text of this article is available to MacroBusiness subscribers

$1 for your first month, then:

$24.99 / month

$249 / year

Cancel at any time through our billing provider, Stripe

About the author

Leith van Onselen is Chief Economist at the MB Fund and MB Super. He is also a co-founder of MacroBusiness. Leith has previously worked at the Australian Treasury, Victorian Treasury and Goldman Sachs.