The Macquarie Serviceability Calculator provides a detailed list of expenses to include in the general living expenses and the additional living expenses.
You’re not required to itemise the expenses. However, categorisation is required in ApplyOnline, so it’s important to take note of how expenses are categorised to ensure the applicants are declaring accurately.
Here we provide guidance when declaring the following expenses that are commonly misallocated:
Notional rent or board may be applicable when the applicant is:
If this applies to any applicant, a notional rental expense of $650 per month per household must be included as a commitment (i.e. there are no exceptions). This is captured in the Annual commitment section under ‘Other’.
Child support or maintenance arrangements need to be captured in the calculator, although depending on the nature of the applicant’s arrangement will determine how to capture this.
If the applicant:
Private health insurances should be captured in the calculator under ‘Additional living expenses’.
Where an applicant is a high-income earner, and hasn’t declared any expense in this section, our team may require further clarification. To help you achieve a one touch approval, ensure you’ve noted why this expense is lower than expected in ApplyOnline.
Private school fees should be captured in the calculator under ‘Additional living expenses’.
We can consider excluding these fees from the servicing calculation if:
For owner occupied properties, strata fees should be added into the ‘General living expenses’ (GLE) of the calculator as they’re part of the household expenditure measure (HEM). In ApplyOnline, these fees would be captured under ‘Primary residence costs’.
For investment properties, strata fees shouldn’t be included in GLE. They should be included under ‘Annual investment property expenses’ in the Gross annual income section.
The Macquarie Serviceability Calculator has household expenditure measure (HEM) built into it and is based off the information you’ve inputted for the applicants, including dependents and gross income.
The general living expenses will be compared to the respective HEM. If:
Note, any expenses noted in ‘Additional living expenses’ won’t be used when the calculator compares GLE to HEM.
In ApplyOnline, you’ll need to itemise each expense category for general living expenses (GLE) and additional living expenses. Like the Macquarie Serviceability Calculator, only the GLE will be compared to the household expenditure measure (HEM) for your applicant(s).
For specific categories, where a low value is input (based on the applicant’s profile):
Also, where GLE is low compared to HEM, you’ll be required to provide 3 months of bank statements. These will be a mandatory document required to submit the application.
Once you’ve input all income, commitments and expenses into the Macquarie Serviceability Calculator for all applicants, the NSR will automatically calculate. We require:
Where the annual surplus is less than $500, we’ll also require evidence of post-settlement savings of at least $10,000.
The Macquarie Serviceability Calculator will calculate the debt to income (DTI) ratio for the applicants.
For information on our DTI caps, see Understanding debt to income ratio.
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