The triggers, the research and the moment an Australian decides to talk to a broker, in a market where brokers now write four out of five new home loans.
Figures in this article describe the wider market and are drawn from the third-party sources listed at the end. They are not Lead Foundry results, and nothing here is a projection of what any individual broker will achieve.
Australia is the most broker-mediated mortgage market there is, and that single fact reorganises the consumer journey compared with almost anywhere else.
MFAA data puts broker share of new residential home loans at 81.0% for the March 2026 quarter, the highest level since records began more than a decade ago, against 55.3% in the March 2018 quarter. Leading aggregators settled A$124.88 billion in that quarter alone, up A$25.51 billion year on year.
Australia now sits alongside the United Kingdom and the Netherlands as one of the few countries where brokers facilitate more than 80% of mortgage lending.
| March 2018 quarter | 55.3% |
|---|---|
| March 2026 quarter | 81.0% |
When four out of five borrowers use a broker, the consumer decision has moved from channel choice to broker choice, which is a competition between you and other brokers rather than between you and a bank.
ABS Lending Indicators for the March quarter 2026 recorded total new dwelling loan commitments falling 6.2% by number and 3.8% by value. Owner-occupier commitments fell 6.9% by number and 4.3% by value, investor commitments fell 5.3% by number, and first home buyer owner-occupier commitments fell 4.3% by number and 6.7% by value.
A softening quarter in a structurally broker-dominated market intensifies competition rather than reducing the channel. There are fewer transactions and the same number of brokers.
Predominantly dated events, which is what makes timing signals so valuable on an Australian record.
| Trigger | What it produces | How urgent |
|---|---|---|
| A fixed rate rolling | Refinance and rate-review enquiry | Dated, and usually the strongest |
| An accepted offer | Purchase finance enquiry | Dated and immediate |
| A deposit reaching a threshold | First home buyer enquiry | Softer, often research-stage |
| A change in circumstances | Restructure or serviceability enquiry | Varies widely |
The field worth paying for: A record carrying a rate roll date or a settlement date is worth materially more than one carrying a product category, because it tells you where in the diary the conversation belongs.
Compressed. Consumers increasingly get an orienting answer from an AI summary before visiting any site. Pew Research found users click a traditional result on 8% of visits when an AI summary is present against 15% without one, and click a link inside the summary on about 1% of visits.
For a broker that means the person arriving at a form has often already formed a view about rates and options, and their view came from somewhere you cannot see.
In a market where four out of five borrowers use a broker, less of the call is spent justifying the channel and more is spent differentiating you from the other brokers who may already have called.
Where Lead Foundry sits, in plain terms: Lead Foundry currently supplies life insurance enquiries in New Zealand. Mortgage supply opens when LoanWatch launches. This is market commentary drawn from MFAA, ABS and Pew data rather than an offer of Australian supply.
Increasingly the question is which broker rather than whether to use one. MFAA data puts broker share of new residential home loans at 81.0% in the March 2026 quarter, up from 55.3% eight years earlier. Consumers typically arrive with a partly formed view from online research and choose on responsiveness and on how well the first conversation addresses their specific timing.
Brokers facilitated 81.0% of all new residential home loans in the March 2026 quarter according to MFAA data, the highest since records began. That places Australia alongside the United Kingdom and the Netherlands as one of the few markets where brokers write more than 80% of mortgage lending.
Mostly dated events: a fixed rate rolling, an accepted offer approaching settlement, a deposit reaching a threshold, or a change in circumstances affecting serviceability. Rate rolls and settlements are the strongest because they attach a date to the decision, which is why timing fields are the most valuable ones on an Australian lead record.
By volume, in the most recent quarter. ABS Lending Indicators recorded total new dwelling loan commitments falling 6.2% by number and 3.8% by value in the March quarter 2026, with owner-occupier commitments down 6.9% by number. Because broker share is at a record high, the effect is more competition per enquiry rather than a shift away from brokers.