Home Loans with frequent flyer points

Earning frequent flyer points for paying off your mortgage is an enticing perk. You have to make mortgage repayments, so why not get points to spend on flights and hotels on the side?

You can check out a range of home loan offers with frequent flyer points in the table below and read more on how these offers work.

But keep in mind that home loan comparison is really about getting a lower interest rate, avoiding fees and finding a loan that suits your specific needs. Don't settle for the wrong home loan just because of a points offer.

How do you earn flyer points with a mortgage?

The way you earn points differs by home loan product and lender. Here are a few examples currently on the market:

• Virgin Money Reward Me home loans with Velocity Points. You earn points for every $100,000 you borrow plus "anniversary" points every three years.
• Qudos Bank Qantas Points Home Loan. You can earn 150 points per $1,000 borrowed every year of the loan.

While you can't earn points on your ANZ Breakfree Package home loan you can avoid the account fee on the ANZ Frequent Flyer Platinum credit card, making it cheaper to earn points.

Be aware: Many of these offers come with package fees or require you to join a rewards program. While the points can be enough to pay for multiple international flights you should always look at how competitive the interest rates are.

Finder survey: Would Australians in different states package a home loan with a credit card?

Should I get a frequent flyer home loan?

Are you a frequent flyer? Seriously, it's an important question. If you travel a lot and are already a member of a rewards program you'll gain a lot more mileage out of a frequent flyer mortgage offer. If you don't, then consider how useful this benefit will really be.

Ask yourself the following:

• Do I fly a lot? The key question is will you really use these points? Do an honest assessment. Rewards points aren't very useful if you accumulate them and never use them. Some programs will let your points expire if you haven't used your account in 18 months.
• Am I likely to read into the fine print? Points work best when you spend the time working out and learning how to really get the most out of them (finder can help with that).
• Am I borrowing enough money to make the points worthwhile? Many frequent flyer offers give you more points for borrowing a large amount of money. Calculate what you can actually earn and what those points will get you.
• Have I truly compared all my options. At finder our advice is to always compare your home loan options and don't choose based on points alone. The real costs of the loan might outweigh the points benefits.

So what can I really get with my frequent flyer points?

To give you an idea of what your points could be worth, here's a table with some flights you can get with 200,000 Velocity Points.

Note: The flight offers above are examples only based on the Velocity Points table. Some of these flights will incur additional costs such as taxes or airline surcharges. More flights are available with partner airlines.

If you'd like to learn more about what kind of frequent flyer programs are available to you, read our comprehensive guide here.

Image: Shutterstock

Written by

Richard Whitten

Editor

Richard Whitten is a money editor at Finder, and has been covering home loans, property and personal finance for 6+ years. He has written for Yahoo Finance, Money Magazine and Homely; and has appeared on various radio shows nationwide. He holds a Certificate IV in mortgage broking and finance (RG 206), a Tier 1 Generic Knowledge certification and a Tier 2 General Advice Deposit Products (RG 146) certification. See full bio

Richard's expertise

Richard has written 538 Finder guides across topics including:

• Home loans
• Property
• Personal finance
• Money-saving tips