Home loans for locum doctors

Start with how you are paid

Lenders sort locum doctors by the way the money reaches you, not by the word "locum". Most locums fit one of four setups.

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• PAYG, through an agency. Lender's view: casual or contract employment. Payslips and a contract. Most lenders want three months of payslips first.

• Your own ABN, as a sole trader. Lender's view: self-employed. How long your ABN has been registered decides which lenders will consider you.

• Your own company or trust. Lender's view: self-employed, through a business entity. The lender reads the entity's financials as well as your personal tax return.

• A hospital salary plus locum work. Lender's view: two incomes, assessed separately. The salary is easy to assess. The extra locum shifts may not count yet.

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If you are unsure which applies, your pay tells you. If tax comes off before the money reaches your account, you are PAYG. If you send invoices, you are working under your ABN. Shifts worked directly for a hospital, whether through its casual pool or on a direct contract, are not locum work in a lender's eyes: they are assessed as ordinary casual PAYG income. For the wider eligibility picture, including registration and employment, see who qualifies for a doctor home loan.

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PAYG locum income

PAYG locum income is the simpler case. Tax is withheld, your payslips show the income, and a lender can verify it in much the same way as a hospital salary.

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Casual work and short contracts

The catch is that most PAYG locum work is casual or on short contracts, and lenders treat casual employment more cautiously than a permanent role. As a general rule, most lenders want three months of PAYG locum income before they count it. Some will accept less, as little as two to four pay cycles, if the income is regular and you have an employment contract with the locum agency that sets out the term and any minimum hours. If your income varies from pay to pay, plan on the full three months.

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Salaried hospital work is different. A registrar's employment contract and a single payslip are usually enough, even on a fixed-term contract, because lenders do not treat it as locum work.

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How the income is averaged

Locum hours change from week to week, so lenders do not take your hourly rate and multiply it out. They work from your average income, or from the year-to-date figure on your latest payslip, provided it covers at least three months. If it does not, they use your last payslip for June or your income statement for the previous financial year. A run of consistent payslips helps, and a quiet month just before you apply can pull the figure down, so the timing of an application is worth a thought.

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ABN locum income

Once you invoice under your own ABN, lenders assess you as self-employed. That brings two questions: how long your ABN has been registered, and what you earn after expenses. Our page on self-employed doctor home loans covers self-employed lending more broadly, including private practice.

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How long your ABN has been registered

This is where lender policies differ most. Some lenders will consider an ABN that has been registered for as little as three months, while others want 12 to 24 months of trading history. With a new ABN, a lender may ask for your business activity statements (BAS), interim financial statements prepared by your accountant, and business bank statements. Once your ABN is 12 to 24 months old, lenders usually rely on the standard self-employed documents: tax returns and financial statements.

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Your history before the ABN counts too. A registrar who moves from a hospital salary to locuming in the same specialty is not starting a new business in the way a lender usually means it. Lenders will generally want to see your previous year's tax return or income summary.

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From Xaviera's files

One locum came to us only three months after registering their ABN, with full financials still seven months away. We used their bank statements, locum invoices and interim financials with a lender that has a medico policy for short ABN histories, and they bought their home then, instead of waiting until the financials were ready.

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What a lender counts as your income

A lender starts with what you invoiced and works down from there:

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• GST comes out first. If you are registered for GST, the 10% on your invoices belongs to the ATO, so lenders assess your income excluding GST. Most locums who supply a hospital, practice or agency must register once their turnover passes $75,000 a year, because those services are generally not GST-free. (GST depends on the facts, so your accountant confirms your own position.)

• Business expenses come out next: indemnity insurance, registration, travel the agency does not cover, and accounting.

• Some items are added back. Many lenders add back depreciation, interest expenses, non-recurring expenses, and super contributions above the super guarantee rate.

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Gaps between contracts

Locums choose when to work, and a lender has to turn that into a yearly figure. Where a lender works from your tax return or BAS, the gaps are already built in, and a year with a long break shows up as a lower income. Where a lender annualises your income so far, the usual practice for locums is to annualise it over 48 or 49 working weeks, roughly 11 months, rather than 52, to allow for gaps and unpaid leave. Lenders do not annualise an hourly or daily rate.

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Either way, evidence that the work continues helps: an employment letter or a renewed contract.

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Working through a company or trust

Some locums work through their own company or trust. The lender then reads the entity's financial statements and tax return as well as your personal return. The personal services income rules generally treat income from your own professional work as yours, whatever structure it passes through, so for most locums the company adds paperwork and time to an application rather than changing the picture.

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Locum work on top of a hospital job

Many locums do locum work and nothing else, but some keep a salaried hospital or private role and locum on top. That is not the same as picking up extra shifts at your own hospital, which lenders treat as overtime. Locum work is short-term fill-in work for another hospital or practice. It can be regular, and it is often paid under an ABN.

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Say a registrar on a hospital salary takes on locum work under an ABN and earns an extra $30,000 or $40,000 a year. Whether that lifts their borrowing depends on the lender. Lenders with a medico policy look at self-employed locum work differently from self-employed income in other industries, and many will count it once there are about three months of it. A lender without a specific medico policy may treat it as ordinary self-employed income, and want financials and tax returns that include it before it counts at all.

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If your lender is not counting the locum income yet, the salary on its own is straightforward to assess, so you can apply on the salary alone and let the locum income count later.

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The first-year tax bill

In your first year under an ABN, nobody withholds tax from your invoices. The tax arrives in one go when you lodge your return, and two things happen at once. You pay the tax for the year just finished, and the ATO starts you on quarterly PAYG instalments, which are prepayments of next year's tax. Sole traders enter the instalment system automatically once their latest return shows $4,000 or more of business and investment income, $1,000 or more of tax payable, and estimated tax of $500 or more. If you have a HECS-HELP debt, the repayment on your locum income is collected at tax time too.

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Source: ATO, Starting PAYG instalments, read 1 October 2026.

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Why a lender cares: lenders ask whether you owe the ATO, and some will check that your ATO account is clear. A few will consider an outstanding tax debt case by case, but it is not looked on favourably, and they generally want it paid before you apply. The safest position is no tax debt at all. Paying it in one lump comes straight out of the savings you were going to use as a deposit.

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The fix is unglamorous and it works: from your first invoice, move a share of every payment into a separate account for tax, and lodge on time. Your accountant can tell you what share suits your income.

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Buying when your work moves around

Many locums travel: a three-month rural contract, a block of shifts interstate, a run of regional emergency work. That matters for a home loan in two ways.

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Move-in rules on first home concessions

First home buyer concessions depend on you living in the home, and the rules are strict. Three examples:

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• Australian Government 5% Deposit Scheme. Move in within 6 months of settlement. Keep living there while the Government guarantee is in place. If you move out, your lender may require you to pay LMI.

• Queensland home and first home concessions (transfer duty). Move in within 1 year of settlement. This cannot be extended. You cannot rent out the home before you move in, or rent out the whole home within a year after. A breach means the duty is reassessed, with interest and penalty tax.

• NSW First Home Buyers Assistance Scheme (transfer duty). Move in within 12 months of settlement. Live there as your principal place of residence for at least 12 continuous months.

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Sources: firsthomebuyers.gov.au, 5% Deposit Scheme FAQs; Queensland Revenue Office, Home concession; Revenue NSW, First Home Buyers Assistance Scheme. All read 1 October 2026.

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Other states have their own versions. The point for a locum is to plan the first year in the home around them. Buy in Brisbane, rent the place out while you finish a rural contract, and move in afterwards, and the Queensland concession is reassessed, because the rules do not allow the home to be rented before you move in. Whether a stint away for work breaks a "continuous" residence rule depends on the state and the facts, so check with your conveyancer before you sign a contract that takes you away in your first year. You can work out the duty either way in the Xandii stamp duty calculator.

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Owner-occupied loans

Your lender has its own version of the same rule. An owner-occupied loan is priced and assessed on the basis that the home is your principal place of residence. As long as it is, lenders do not mind you working away for stretches at a time, and you can rent out a room, but not the whole home. If you expect to rent the whole home out while you locum elsewhere, tell your broker before you apply, not after. The loan may need to be set up as an investment loan, which can change the rate, and LMI waiver limits are often lower for investment lending.

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Can a locum get an LMI waiver?

Yes. Lenders mortgage insurance (LMI) is a one-off premium most lenders charge when you borrow more than 80% of a property's value, and many lenders waive it for eligible medical professionals. To qualify, you need current AHPRA registration and to be working in medicine. Locum work is fine, whether you are paid PAYG or under an ABN.

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The waiver lender still assesses your income under its own policy, so the work is in matching the waiver to a lender whose medico policy suits the way you are paid. Our guide to home loans for doctors covers which lenders offer LMI waivers, how far they go, and which professions qualify.

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Worked example: seven months into ABN locum work

This is an illustration, not a quote. Dr Nguyen spent three years as a salaried emergency registrar at a metropolitan hospital, earning about $170,000 a year including overtime. In March 2026 she stepped out of training, registered an ABN and for GST, and began locuming in emergency departments through two agencies. By October she has seven months of trading:

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• An average rate of about $160 an hour, excluding GST

• About 36 hours a week when working, with four weeks off between blocks

• $150,000 invoiced from March to September, excluding GST

• About $9,000 of business expenses over the same period

• She wants to buy a $950,000 home to live in, with a 10% deposit of $95,000

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Three lenders, one doctor, the same week

• Wants two years of ABN history. Income it can use: none yet. Not an option until March 2028 at the earliest.

• Wants 12 months of ABN history. Income it can use: none yet. An option from March 2027, most likely with her tax return and accountant-prepared figures.

• Has a medico policy for short ABN histories and annualises the year so far over 11 months. Income it can use: about $221,600 ($141,000 after expenses over seven months, annualised over 11 months). An option now, using her invoices, bank statements and interim financials.

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No lender counts her old $170,000 salary, because she no longer earns it, though lenders will want to see it as evidence of her history. Depending on the lender, the same doctor in the same week is assessed on nothing at all or on about $221,600. The difference is not her income. It is the lender's policy, and that is why lender choice matters more for locums than for almost anyone else.

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Two more things in her file

• The tax bill. Her 2026 return, lodged in October, shows four months of locum income with no tax withheld. On our rough estimate at 2025-26 rates she owes about $25,000, and PAYG instalments start for 2026-27. If she pays it from savings, her deposit shrinks. If she does not, most lenders will want it paid before she applies.

• The deposit. A $95,000 deposit on $950,000 means a loan of $855,000, a 90% loan-to-value ratio. Without an LMI waiver she would pay LMI. With one she would not, and being a locum does not stop her qualifying. So the most valuable lender for her is one that both offers the waiver and uses the third approach.

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You can see indicative borrowing figures across a range of lenders for your own details with the Xandii home loan comparison tool, then talk the result through with Xaviera.

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What to have ready

If you locum as PAYG

• Your two most recent payslips, showing year-to-date income

• Your current contract or engagement letter, and any letter confirming future shifts

• Your last two income statements or tax returns, if your hours vary

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If you locum under your own ABN

• Your ABN and GST registration details

• BAS for each quarter since you started, if your ABN is new

• Interim financial statements for the year so far, prepared by your accountant

• Business bank statements, ideally from an account used only for locum income

• Your last two personal tax returns and notices of assessment, plus company or trust returns if you use one

• Your agency contract

• Your AHPRA registration details, and your last hospital payslips if you left a salaried role recently

• Details of anything you owe the ATO, including any payment plan

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Six ways to make a locum application easier

1. Talk to a broker before you leave a salaried job. A salaried role is easier to borrow against than locum income, so it often makes sense to buy before you make the move. The exception is when the higher locum income lets you borrow more, and it often does: locum work usually pays well above hospital rates, which is why many doctors do it.

2. Keep locum income in its own bank account. Clean business statements are quicker for a lender to read.

3. Lodge BAS and tax returns on time. Lenders work from what has been lodged, not what is about to be.

4. Ask your agency for an employment letter or contract. Lenders use it to confirm the term of your engagement and any minimum hours.

5. Keep your income the same from pre-approval to settlement. The income a lender approves you on has to be the income you have when the loan settles, so avoid changing how you are paid, or taking a long break, while you are buying.

6. Ask your accountant to show any additional super contributions and one-off costs separately, so a lender can consider them as add-backs.

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Frequently asked questions

I have just started locum work under my own ABN. Am I too new?

Possibly not. Some lenders will consider income from an ABN that has been registered for as little as three months, provided the supporting documentation is available. Others want 12 to 24 months of trading history. Your history as a salaried doctor in the same field usually helps.

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Will locum work on top of my hospital job increase my borrowing power?

It can, but often not straight away. Many lenders count extra ABN income after three months. Until then, expect to be assessed on your salary alone.

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Do lenders count the GST on my invoices?

No. GST belongs to the ATO, so lenders assess your income excluding GST.

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Can I get an LMI waiver as a locum?

Yes. Lenders that offer medical LMI waivers need you to hold current AHPRA registration and be working in medicine, and locum work is fine. The lender still assesses your income under its own policy.

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Can I buy a home in one city while I locum in another?

Yes, as long as the home stays your principal place of residence. Check the move-in rules first: most first home concessions require you to move in within a set time and live there, and an owner-occupied loan assumes you will. You can rent out a room, but if you plan to rent the whole home out while you are away, tell your broker before you apply.

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Is a low doc loan an option for a new locum?

Some non-bank lenders offer low doc loans that rely on BAS, bank statements or an accountant's declaration instead of tax returns. Some lenders with a medico policy will also do short-term low doc loans for doctors, though not every medico lender offers this.

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Talk it through with Xaviera

Xaviera has 25 years in banking and lending, and has spent the last seven broking with medical professionals. A short call is the quickest way to see which lenders suit the way you are paid now, and which will suit it in six months.