Transaction histories or bank statements?

When you apply for a home loan, banks will ask for several supporting documents.

The ones that tend to cause the most trouble for your application are transaction histories and statements.

Read on to make sure your financial evidence is acceptable to the bank when applying.

What is a bank statement?

A statement is either a statement you have received in the mail or an online statement. It must contain:

• The bank logo,

• Your full name,

• Address,

• Account number,

• Opening balance,

• Closing balance and

• All transactions during the statement period.

Be careful! If the statement does not include your address & name then it is actually a transaction history.

What is a transaction history?

This is a record of all transactions in a given period and is available through internet banking.

It contains:

• The bank logo,

• The account number,

• A list of all transactions in the given period and

• A running balance.

• Note that CSV files / exported data are not accepted. Please print out a full transaction history.

Why do you need to provide both?

We normally need both because a transaction history does not show your full details so the banks will not accept it on its own. A statement on the other hand has your full details, however only gives the account history for one month and may not show recent transactions.

By providing both your lender can verify that you own the account and can view the transactions for an extended period of time.

What do you need?

Please refer to the email from your mortgage broker with the specific list of documents required for your situation.

In most cases, you will to provide the following:

• For home loans: One recent statement AND a transaction history for the last six months.

• For cheque or savings accounts: One recent statement AND a transaction history for the last three months.

• For credit cards: One recent statement.

• For personal loans: One recent statement.

• For car loans: You may need to call the provider to obtain a statement as statements are not always issued. They can usually fax this directly to you.

Please try to send these to us all in one go, in the correct order and with no pages missing. Banks need to see every page! This will enable us to submit your loan application as quickly as possible.