Latest news with #EvyKassiotes
News.com.au
10-06-2025
- Business
- News.com.au
‘Such a scam': 26-year-old mortified over how little she's paid off her home loan
A letter from the bank has made one young woman conclude that owning your own home is a 'scam' that she's fallen for. Evy Kassiotes, 26, took to social media to claim home ownership hasn't quite lived up to her financial expectations. 'Owning a home is actually such a scam,' she said. 'I got a letter in the mail to tell us about the progression of our loan and how much we've paid off.' Ms Kassiotes then expressed her shock at learning how little of a dent she had made in her mortgage in almost two years. 'What do you mean we've only paid off $3000 since October 2023? It is now May 2025,' she said. 'Like are you joking? Is this a joke? Am I getting pranked?' Home loans accrue interest just like any other debt. The amount of interest someone pays on their loan depends on interest rates, the loan amount, and the bank they're with, but, on average, Aussies are paying around 6.27 per cent interest on their home loans per annum. Some homeowners choose just to pay back the interest on the loan, which means the loan doesn't shrink, but sometimes, this can be offset by the increase in the property's market value. The fact the 26-year-old hasn't made much of a dent in her mortgage isn't unusual, but it didn't sit right with her. Ms Kassiotes stressed that she knows she's privileged to own a home, but the letter just made her think, 'What the f**k?' The 26-year-old's horror resonated with Aussies who chimed in to share their own mortgage issues. 'This is what people don't understand. And now that there may be a 5 per cent deposit option people will be drowning in debt,' one said. 'Mortgage interest is a scam. Owning a home is all right; at least it's not dead money like rent,' one argued. 'People laugh at me as I plan to sell both my houses and move overseas to pay 0 per cent interest/income/capital gains tax,' one person said. 'I hate those letters,' another commiserated. Others were more concerned that Ms Kassiotes was blindsided by how little she'd paid off, reminding her to do her research. 'Isn't this something you should have researched prior to taking out said mortgage? How is it not common knowledge that you basically pay hardly anything off the principal of your mortgage for the first half of your loan?' one person said. 'The amount of people who take out home loans but don't really understand how a home loan actually works. You gave up 30 years of financial freedom but didn't bother to understand what you signed up for?' another questioned. 'You have to put extra repayments. Even if it's $50 a week it will make a difference. Change all of your bank accounts to offset. This will also make a huge difference. Never just pay the minimum,' someone advised. The fact some Aussies are only paying off the interest on their home loans makes sense when you consider how rough it is for mortgage holders in 2025. According to financial comparison website Finder, in 95 per cent of suburbs in Australia, it is cheaper to rent than to own a home Mortgage stress has also skyrocketed in the past five years. Finder's Consumer Sentiment Tracker that revealed 37 per cent of mortgage holders struggled to pay their home loans in May. More than 1 in 10 homeowners say they have missed a mortgage repayment in the past six months, including 5 per cent who missed just one repayment and 7 per cent who have missed more than one. Of those who missed one or more mortgage payments in the past six months, 1 in 3 said high interest rates meant they could no longer afford to cover their home loan. Financial expert Julian Finch said that he had noticed a grim trend of people struggling to pay their mortgages. 'We've had a relief with rates easing a touch. Certainly it was peak pain around Christmas time last year, I had someone, ring me and say, 'I've got to choose between my mortgage and feeding my family',' he said. Mr Finch said that, before you start paying down your mortgage, you need to ensure you're not just paying off the interest. The financial expert also warned that, even when rates come down, not all banks automatically adjust repayments. 'If you can maintain your repayment it helps you get ahead, but if people need a pressure release, it can be worth a phone call,' Mr Finch said. 'If your payment hasn't moved down, you can call your bank and ask them to recalculate it.'
Daily Mail
09-06-2025
- Business
- Daily Mail
I finally bought a house - this is why I think home ownership is a 'scam' after living in mine for less than two years
An Aussie has branded owning a home a 'scam' after receiving an alarming letter in the mail less than two years after she purchased her first home. Evy Kassiotes, 25, bought her first property in Sydney in October 2023, but has been left horrified after discovering how little of her mortgage she has paid off after 19 months. The bodybuilder, who is currently working two jobs, shared her frustrations on TikTok and said that she understood it was a 'privilege' to own a property, but that it felt like she would never be free from her mortgage repayments. 'Owning a home is actually such a scam,' she said in the video. Ms Kassiotes explained she had opened a 'letter of progression on the loan' which showed how much she had paid off, and felt as if she was being 'pranked'. 'What do you mean we've only paid $3,000 since October 2023? It's now May 2025,' she said. The Sydneysider said she was shocked by how much of her payments were swallowed up by interest on the loan and how little difference it made on the original amount. Ms Kassiotes, like most young Australians trying to get a foot on the property ladder, has to battle a perfect storm of a crippling housing undersupply boosting competition and prices, combined with punishingly high interest rates intended to tame inflation. Commenters on her video agreed, saying that home ownership had grown unaffordable. 'Owning your own home is the biggest scam,' one viewer said. 'All the fees, all the interest, all the repairs and maintenance, all the council rates, and water rates, and even when you do pay it off your still left with council rates and repairs ect.' 'Daylight robbery! I can't bring myself to look anymore,' another wrote. 'Wait till you work out how much you'll pay for that loan over the course of 30 years…,' someone said. Ms Kassiotes replied: 'I remember I did a random calculation and almost passed away.' Another commented that they work in home lending and mortgages were what they did all day and they were 'still bitter about how little' they had paid off. Someone else advised the 25-year-old to open an 'offset account' to help reduce the interest rate on her mortgage. 'This August we will be in our home two years but just got a little over 26 years left,' they said. 'Just from having a bit of money in our offset account we have knocked 1.5 years off already not paying any extra.' Ms Kassiotes said she knows owning your home is a 'privilege' but was shocked to learn how little she'd paid off her loan so far despite plugging away at repayments for 18 months (stock) An offset account is a separate bank account that is linked to your home loan. Homeowners can deposit their salary, savings, and make everyday transactions in this account and the balance in this offset account is then used to reduce the amount of interest you're charged on your home loan. Ms Kassiotes noted that she already had an offset account but that it didn't blunt the sting of how little progress she had made on her loan. Home prices have hit new highs and will likely continue to grow as lower interest rates send buyers piling back into the property market amid a lack of new housing supply. The median dwelling in Australia was worth $831,288 in May - a 0.5 per cent jump on the month before - data released by property analytics firm Cotality, formerly CoreLogic, this month showed. Every capital city, as well as the combined regions, exhibited growth of 0.4 per cent or more, in a broad-based recovery largely down to buyers feeling better about their purchasing capacity. 'Undoubtedly, interest rates have had a positive flow through to housing markets since February,' said Cotality research director Tim Lawless. 'But I certainly wouldn't call the rate of growth shooting the lights out. A 0.4 per cent to 0.5 per cent growth rate is much more sustainable than what we were seeing, say, in early 2023 up to mid-2024.' The trend was echoed in the PropTrack Home Price Index report, also published this month, produced by REA Group. REA Group senior economist Eleanor Creagh said the trend was expected to continue due to a chronic lack of new housing supply, population growth and targeted buyer incentives. 'In combination with interest rates continuing to move lower, these factors are likely to drive further growth throughout the remainder of 2025,' she said. After a shallow and short-lived downturn at the end of 2024, the recovery in prices had more to do with sentiment than a genuine improvement in serviceability or access to credit, considering interest rates were still in restrictive territory, Mr Lawless said. 'And we know from historical correlations, consumer confidence and housing activity tend to go hand-in-hand.'
