Teachers Mutual Bank Limited began offering the Help to Buy shared equity scheme on 27 July 2026, becoming only the third authorised lender after CBA and Bank Australia, with broker access opening from 6 October 2026.
The Australian Government Help to Buy scheme has a new lender. Teachers Mutual Bank Limited, the group behind Teachers Mutual Bank, UniBank, Health Professionals Bank and Firefighters Mutual Bank, began offering the shared equity scheme directly to members on 27 July 2026. It is only the third authorised lender since the scheme launched, joining Commonwealth Bank and Bank Australia, and its accredited mortgage broker network is set to gain access from 6 October 2026 once an initial pilot period finishes. For first home buyers who have been eligible for months but stuck choosing between just two banks, a third option widens the field.
Help to Buy lets eligible buyers purchase with a deposit as low as 2 per cent, with the government taking an equity stake of up to 40 per cent on a new home or up to 30 per cent on an existing one, with no lenders mortgage insurance charged on the government's share. It is a genuinely useful scheme on paper, but a small lender panel has been one of its practical limits. When only two banks write the loans, buyers have less room to shop around on rate, service, or product features, and brokers have had limited ability to place clients into the scheme at all.
Teachers Mutual Bank's entry changes that dynamic, even if only slightly for now. It gives members of its four brands, many of whom are teachers, nurses, paramedics and firefighters, a mutual bank alternative to the two major players. And the planned broker rollout in October is arguably the bigger structural shift: most first home buyers arrange their loan through a broker rather than walking into a branch, so a lender that opens Help to Buy to its broker network expands genuine access rather than just adding a name to a list. Your mortgage broker or lender can talk you through exactly how the scheme is structured with each provider before you apply, and the Scheme Comparison Tool can help you weigh Help to Buy against other options such as the 5% Deposit Scheme.
The core eligibility rules are the same regardless of which lender you use. Taxable income caps sit at $103,000 for single applicants and $165,000 for joint applicants and single parents, after both thresholds were increased for the 2026-27 financial year. Housing Australia also confirmed 10,000 new places for the same financial year, on top of the places already allocated. Property price caps still apply and vary by city and state, so a property that qualifies in Brisbane may sit above the cap in Adelaide or Darwin.
If you are already eligible and have been waiting on the sidelines, this is not a reason to rush, but it is a reason to check back in on your options. A wider lender panel generally means more competitive offers over time as banks compete for the same pool of eligible buyers.
Use these tools to see how Help to Buy compares with your other options and what it means for your borrowing: